by lee de forest, ph.d., d.sc., d.eng.
father of radio
no book in two generations, no book since jules verne, has undertaken to do what hugo gernsback in the first decade of our century has here so outstandingly achieved.
he is gifted with a mind eternally alert, trained from childhood to observe and think. his unbridled imagination has ever fed on the facts of science and technology which his habit of omniverous reading has been continually storing within his brain. as result of this unusual combination his tireless energies have been directed, since childhood in luxembourg, to writing popular science in a fashion peculiarly attractive to young men and boys who, like himself, possess a keen interest in all realms of physical nature.
his first essay in this field was his monthly magazine, modern electrics, the first to attempt to outline in language understandable by american youth the newly developing science of wireless communication. he made of this first venture into the publishing business a medium wherein, amid serious newsy articles regarding current electrical developments, his eager imagination could find full play. the most outstanding, most extraordinary prophecies which this young clairvoyant had at that time conceived—all based on his keen observations and appreciation of their real significance and trend—he chose to record in the guise[pg 16] of a fanciful romance bearing the strange, cabalistic title of this book.
the author, even at that early date (1911) had a clear conception of future television, then quite unheard of, almost undreamed of. he dubs it "telephot" and outlines its revolutionary utilities. his hero, ralph, explains to his enamorata how man has mastered weather-control. only today has a professor shown new york city how to end its water famine by man-made torrential rains. years in advance of their advent he describes libraries of microfilm projected on large screens; and news printed electrolytically, without printer's ink. today we begin to read of this as being partially commercialized. his "menograph," or thought recorder, is today crudely realized in our lie-detector. by means of his "hypnobioscope" most of scholastic studying is done while the pupil sleeps. who is bold enough to scoff at the possibility of such a delightful method? for one, not i.
"most of the studying was done while one slept," explains ralph—a statement truly applicable to many a somnolent student's performance today!
ralph explains, as of the year 2660, the resuscitation of animal (human) life years after the body has been drained of blood. yet only yesterday a russian doctor claims to have accomplished this "miracle." his 750-year future has already begun to be realized. many utopias are here foretold, such as absolutely permanent non-wearing, metallic highways, where trolley-cars and gas-driven autos are only ancient memories, long obsolete.
"only electrobiles were to be seen." here the author badly misjudged the future trend of auto-travel, away from the electric.
[pg 17]
he foresaw far better night-illuminated streets than we have yet attained. let us hope that we must not wait 750 years until cities are "as bright by night as by day"; nor new york's climate, man-controlled, to be "the finest on earth," with temperatures perennially at 72, sunshine all day, rain for one hour only, every night! in that future we shall have reliable transfer of sun energy into electric by means of photo-electric elements responsive to ultra-violet radiation.
in musak we already have the wide distribution of music which mr. gernsback foresaw in 1911; also our night baseball games, then first foretold. his airplanes launching from roof-tops we partly realize already in our helicopter mail service. but instead of his agglomeration of colored light-beams for direction of aviation we have the far reaching radio beacons, coupled with loran.
even today's mysterious "flying saucers" he foretold with nice detail!
foreseeing the vast increase in global population (the world's gravest menace) ralph has so deftly applied science to plant growth that we shall reap four crops of wheat per year in sun-heated glass houses of county-sized acreage, to feed the new billions. he fears not an overcrowded, 200 million metropolitan new york!
only today i read of a recent system for using heat from deep earth for house-warming, now being commercialized. "ralph" described the same arrangement forty years ago!
here is liquid fertilizer sprayed as a crop accelerator; and plant-root stimulation by means of high-frequency currents, wholesale diathermy applied to farming; and many other improvements in farm procedure which make this book profitable reading for today's science-minded farmers.
[pg 18]
the author foresaw a much-to-be-desired manufacture of news-print from the resultant excessive growth of grain stocks, thereby terminating today's wanton destruction of our forests for comic supplements and sexy pulps.
last year in the bell laboratories i witnessed the recording on paper of the complexities of my voice, very much as ralph described it in 1911 to his a.d. 2660 friends.
as to the plausibility of ralph's conquest of gravitation i refer the reader to the recently published general field equations of dr. einstein. ralph insisted, even in 1911, that gravitation is indeed wave form, similar to the electromagnetic, and that by interference there—between the force of gravitation may be partially nullified. let us wait until 2660 to see if he was correctly reported. this and many other strange things our descendants may see.
but to me the most impressive pages of this strange book are those that outlined with striking clarity the basic idea of radar as we know it today. although gummed over with reference to imaginary metals, inter-planetary ships travelling at comet speeds, and a very earthy romance, the uncanny foresight of hugo gernsback in 1911 into the realities of world war ii constitutes perhaps the most amazing paragraphs in this astonishing book of prophecy.
chicago, ill.
may 1950
