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About Herald and news. (Klamath Falls, Or.) 1942-current | View Entire Issue (June 24, 1943)
Juno 24, 1043 HERALD AND NEWS, KLAMATH FALLS, OREGON PAGE N1N1 Page, Guthrie Experiment With Radar Principles to Find Right Combination (Editor's Not: By 1032, k. enlists it Mia nnvul research la boratory hod developed radars radio "eyes" so that It could bo urd ashore to detect ap proaching enemy pianos. But the equipment win too clumsy for shlphonrd uo. Not until a super itliorl radio wave, sort of elec trical bullet or pulse, was used, was It possible to undertake de sign of a compact ynt hlgh-pow-ered shipboard let. At that point the main development work wai taken over by Sciential Robert M. Paun and an assistant, Robert C. Guthrie. Theirs waa the Job of building modern radar. Here la the fourth of aix dally Install nienta of John M. Hlghtower'a atory of rnda). By JOHN M. HIOHTOWER (Copyright, 1943, by The Asao elated Preaa) WASHINGTON. June 24 m Puo and Guthrie started tholr work with tho basic prlnclplea of radar, Including Leo C. Young'a pulse application and Loula A. Gebhard'a early pulte experimenta, and with a wealth of detail on how high-frequency waves and pulses behave when bouncing off of ahipa and air planes. They were like men with lead, gunpowder, Iron and wood and an Idea that if you got them to gether In the right combination, you could hit a bull's-eye at 300 yards. Their purpose waa to make a radio detection machine which would collect, automatically re cord and correlato data about a distant plane or ship, and come up quickly with the answer, ahowlng position, angle and apeed. Speed Necessary It was all well and good In the old daya to pick up an air plane on a fixed radar beam and by figuring the angle of reflec tion determine the distance of the plane from the transmitter. Page had to transform that lead pencil operation Into an adding machine calculation that could be performed at apllt-tecond speed. ' Moreover, fixed antennae of the kind experimented with were no good on ship; they had to niovo aa well as be compact. alnce a ahip it subject to attack from any quarter. During the time he waa work ing on these radar problems, Page also was compelled by ur- research to work on 10 other experimenta which had nothing to do with radar. "But 1 would always ateal him off those other projects and tell him to put all tlio time he could on radar," says Dr. Albert Hoyt Taylor, now chief navy physicist. Complications These complications and Page's thorough-going work stretched out radar development consider ably. But this perseverance re sulted in the production of one act, a aort of haywire rig of wood and metal, wires and coils and tubes a typical experl mental Job and while It got limited results, he did not con alder It successful. When Pago's second set, hla first conclusive radar produc tion, waa finished and put Into operation, It gave "satisfactory results at long range," which la to aay that It detected random airplanes to a maximum dis tance of five miles. Great Moment It waa a great moment, a peak In science for all of them at the laboratory when the first pulse came flashing back from that mnchino. Somo time later Page and Guthrie completed a third act their second successful one and when It waa shooting pulses down tho Potomac river, they could detect planes above tho naval proving ground at Dahlgron, Va 40 miles from Washington. Radar by this time was ac quiring some powerful cham pions. within the navy Itself. One who later became director nf tlin Inhnrntnrv nflnr a tnlir nf duty as chief of tho bureau of engineering was Rear Admiral Harold G. Bowen. Another, who preceded Bowon at the labor atory by several years was Cap tain H. R, Greenlee. ., Funds Low In lO.'IU radar work was badly short of funds. Captain Green lee and Dr. Taylor went to work on Rep. (now Senator) Scrughnm, Nevada democrat, who then was the dominant figure and later DANCE EVERY SATURDAY NIGHT SKATELAND SIS Klamath Are. Music Pappy Gordon's Oregon Hillbillies Auspices Veterans of Foreign Wars chairman of the house naval ap propriations subcommittee They first dlscuasod the mat ter briefly and Informally with Scrugham at a dinner party, and ha appeared not deeply concern ed. Tho following Sunday, Greonlco, Taylor and another scientist from the laboratory corncrod the Novadan In his capl tol office and discussed their needa In as much detail aa they darod and without In any way disclosing even that they were working on radio detection. Jim Scrugham listened impassively and bade them goodbye without committing himself. Got Money "We thought we had failed In our mission," Taylor recalled. "But next morning Jim called and said we would get the money." Scrugham waa a trained engi neer and a man accustomed to deal with technicians and sci entists. Even without getting more than a superficial look at NRL'a work, he sensed that some thing of considerable importance waa afoot. Through Scrugham's work primarily, the laboratory got lta firat $100,000 from con gresa for long-range research. Greenlee's aucccasor at the laboratory was Captain Hollls N. Cooley, a naval officer with out standing ability to communicate his Ideas and enthuslams to oth ers. Cooley worked under Bow- en, who then was chief of the bureau of engineering, and was powerfully aided and abetted by him in tho high pressuro sales manship In which he engaged soon after taking office. As fleet admirals, including on one occasion the commander- in-chief showed up at the navy department, Cooley would nab them and talk them Into visiting the laboratory where they got their first look at radar in oper ation. Congressional Support While this energetic captain still was in charge of the labor atory, Bowen decided the time had arrived to deal frankly with the congressional committeemen who had been stringing along for three years furnishing money for projects they had not real facts about. Great expansion of the research center was in pros pect, the admiral foresaw, and that could be accomplished-only with the support of congress. Bowen slashed through the numerous layers of red tape that then swathed radar in the navy, and he Invited members of the house naval appropriations sub committee to see for thcmsclvos what great things wcro In the making. They were committed to secrecy and the admiral is most proud of the fact that the confidences were never violated. The committee was so sold on radar that after the laboratory got Just about any money It asked for. First Try-out By the end of 1036 plans had been well advanced to give radar Its first try-out at sea some thing that Taylor had proposed in essence in 1022. The 1936 set was vastly different from the simple tactical Instrument hhe had in mind 14 years before, and its ability to pick up airplanes miles off in cloud, fog or dark ness or high In a clear blue sky, for that matter was what gave it sharply focusscd significance undreamed of in 1022. In April, 1937, radar worked over salt water on the old-four-stack destroyer Lcaryi Pago took out a crew of NLR scientists to operate the outfit. In appear ance It was another haywire rig, but in results, while it was not all that was desired, it proved to be a successful outfit, detect ing planes at considerable dis tances. "We felt that although It was flimsy and hard to work, we were getting somewhere," Page says of it now. New Experiments Characteristic of radar's prog ress at this stage, as real funds began to como available, was that while development along proved workable, lines was press ed forward aa rapidly aa possible, new experiments were simultan eously being made Into the un known. Thus In tho years that the first crudo Instruments were going to sea, Dr. Claude Clccton, who had dono soma work on ex tremely short radio waves at the University of Michigan, L. R. Phllpott from tho University of Idaho and John P. Hagon from Connecticut Wcsloyan undertook pioneer work In frequencies pre viously almost undreamed of for radio detection purposes. Pulse Altimeter One experiment by this group was the pulse altimeter, a min iature radar for airplanes which receives echoes from the earth's surface and thus gives a pilot constant Information on his alti tude regardless of weather. Phll pott, Hagcn and Cleeton all did work on this and all three men hold Important positions at the laboratory now. After their adventures and ex periments on the destroyer Leary, the NRL tcientists re turned to their fcenchei and made several additional inventions which gave the detectiol equip ment greatly improved perform a nee. Operation Started By February, 1938, high-pow ered pulse radar equipment was in operation at the laboratory and planes were detected at a range of 50 miles. Tho following month Dr. Tay lor directed the formation of a task group under Gebhard, then head of the laboratory's develop mcnt section and creator of the original pulse transmitting equip mcnt a dozen years before. The purpose of this group, largest yet assigned to a single radar project simultaneously, was to develop and perfect a prototype lor commercial manufacture. Model XAF The force Included Page, Guth rie, H. E. Rcppert, A. A. Varcla, I. H. Page and Lt. E. Luke. Dur ing that year they built radar model XAF and were ready for a full-scale test at sea. This aet, which atill is In work ing order at the laboratory and probably will go into the Smith sonian institution museum some day, was installed on the battle ship New York In December, 1B38, and for the next three months underwent extensive tests during battle maneuvers, OREGON AFL MEET EUGENE, June 24 (At Con tinuation of the referendum sys tem for election of officers at tho Oregon State Federation of Labor convention was approved last night without an anticipat ed battle. Convention forecasts had been that a resolution calling for se lection of officers by direct vote from the floor would be a bit ter issue. Other resolutions adopted yes terday opposed a state sales tax, urged a retail price rollback to levels of May IS, 1042, protest ed importation of alien labor, asked that insurance under the new state motor vehicle respon sibility act be made available by the state and not limited to private companies, objected to tho national youth administra tion's vocational training pro gram, supported the Wagner Dingle bill for extension of so cial security. Kaiser Yards to Start 'Victory' Ship Building PORTLAND, June 24 () Oregon Shipbuilding corpora tion, one of the nation's fastest producers of Liberty ships, soon will start a $5,000,000 altera tion and expansion program for the switchover to Victory ship construction. Plans were announced last night by Edgar F. Kaiser, vice president and general manager of the three Henry J. Kaiser yards In the Portland-Vancouver, Wash., area. He said the expenditure to provide facili ties for building the new type craft was authorized by the ma ritime commission while he was in Washington recently. . ISOLUTIS WAR BONDS and LIFE INSURANCE Help Prevent Inflation Oregon Mutual Life policyholders are buying hoods individually i : i and they are buying mm bonds through their purchase of life insur ance, because life insurance company dollars are going to war bonds Every dollar saved, whether in bonds or life insurance helps prevent inflation. Hmefoipir v Alk tht.il J I agenti! shout tj f the complete 4 I way protection I I of the Home. J keeper PUa. LYNN ROYCROFT US North Seventh Street OREGON MUTUAL LIFE INIURANCI COMPANY Kisses for Ground and Girl - -e Back from a year in the Aleutians, Navy Seabee Frank J. Narta kisses the soil of the good old U. S. A., then smacks Seattle reporter Jerri Jacobs, who came down to interview the sailora. Fellow Sea bees get a kick out of both osculations. Elk Hills Oil Contract fair, Says Standard Oil SAN FRANCISCO, June 24 H. D. Collier, president of the Standard Oil Company of Cali fornia, in a statement just given out here, asserts that the origin al agreement between the navy and the oil company covering development of the Elk Hills oil reserve is fair to both parties, accomplished the navy's long-de-sircd objective and is in the pub lic Interest and adds that if the navy desires to tcrminato the contract, Standard of Califor nia will of course continue to Own and operate its own in the Elk Hills pending further nego tiations with the navy. . The statement reads: "Standard of California has been advised that for technical, legal reasons, the contract be tween tfie navy and Standard of California for development of the Elk Hills oil reserve has been declared by a representa tive of the department of Justice to be invalid. This contract was proposed by the navy depart ment and was designed to con solidate the area under navy control in the Interest of con servation and to insure perpetua tion of the area as a naval re serve in the public interest. As compensation. Standard of Cali fornia was to operate the com bined properties as a single unit in the navy's behalf and to se cure its proportionate and legiti mate compensation for its per centage of the total reserves out of production. "The agreement, approved by the president, was based on auth ority contained in a congression al statute of 1038 which both the navy department and Stan- Your WAR BOND PURCHASES IN JUNE WILL BUY 4 FIGHTER PLANES TO ESCORT "THE PELICAN BOMBER" BOUGHT IN MAY..'. . Fighter Plane Bond Contest Standings Henley $29,896.85 Merrill 28,347.50 Malin 25,60375 Sprague River 18,302.50 Keno 11,172.50 Gilchrist 10,000.00 Chil.-Ft. Klamath.. 6,252.50 Bonanxa 5,210.00 Bly-Beatry 4,302.50, fMMMMMMHMsWssaWaVsfstoXsBaM 1310 Main tfi dard of California believed fully adequate to support the type of agreement ultimately concluded. It would appear irom informa tion so far available to this com pany that the sole question is one of interpretation of the law under which the navy depart ment and this company proceed ed to negotiate. Fundamentally, the agreement was fair to both parties, accomplished the navy department's long desired objec tive, and was in the public inter est." "If the navy, In the light of the justice department's opinion, de sires to terminate the contract, the company will of course con tinue to own and operate its lands in the Elk Hills pending further negotiations with the navy. This company desires to cooperate with the navy in every way possible In serving the best interests of our country." WPB Gives Okay to Aluminum Plant WASHINGTON. June 24 (P) The war production board (WPB) has approved the application of the Columbia Metals corpora tion, Portland, Ore., to con struct a plant to develop a pro cess for recovering alumina from clay, Rep. Angcll (R-Ore.) said today. Angell said he was told the WPB will arrange immediately with the proper government agency for a contract to finance construction of the plant Classified Ads Bring Results. We Salute the Farmers of Klamath County- Who help to keep ui a nation of milk drinkers, military and civilian! For the nutrition and vitamin content that keeps our army on the march, our . civilians on the job use Crater Lake Dairy Producti. Jfome j Oregon News Notes By The Associated Press The Keep Oregon Green com mittee urged the enrollment of Oregon youth In the Green Guard to protect the state for ests this summer . . . Dr. Ho race C. Terrell, English depart ment head at Llnfleld college, CLEARANCE! FALLS QnaU. Jtaka jbaiif PtoJucU has been granted a leave of ab sence to serve in the Red Cross foreign service . . . Marshall Leathers and John Osburn, As toria hotel men, announced pur chase of the Hotel Gcarhart , , . Bandon city officials report ed the municipal bonded debt HAT ALE Our large millinery stock of straws and summer felts. All colors. All head sizes. VALUES UP TO $6.95 VALUES UP TO $10.95 Q GHEfliEBV has been reduced to $100,100 . . . A visit by Vice Admiral John H. Towers, Pacific fleet air force commander, to the As toria naval air station waa dis closed by the 13th naval district. Sell your used articles through Herald-News classified ads and convert the cash into bonds. Call 3124 today. 1) Phone S101
