Category: Anticipation, History of

JF Ptak Science Books   Post 2281

The way of the new world, the spread of commercialism and of consumerism, the increase in the size of a middle class that was actually approaching what we today would think of as a middle class, the wanting rise of places for disposable income to go from millions of new people with spare money to spend, led the sellers of stuff-immemorial to start advertising their bits on the side of out-of-doors everything. The fight for the attention span of the new consumer went from the newspapers and magazines to the side of buildings and then, as the motor car began to proliferate, to thousands and hundreds of thousands of miles of roadway.

Billboards to buildings, and buildings as billboards, and more–as some of the early branders might’ve seen it, the sky was the limit, or at least so for this caricature of the impending future, as seen in Punch, or the London Chiarivari  (‘Picturesque London – or, sky-signs of the times’, 6 September 1890, p. 119.)

That of course was a view to the near-future–the reality of the situation was more like what was portrayed by a watercolor by Orlando Parry, ‘A London street scene’, in 1834, so imaging a step-beyond may not have been too difficult a thing to portray:

[Image Source:  Ragpickinghistory  http://ragpickinghistory.co.uk/tag/london/]

A more recent example of the threat of rampant billboardism and the struggle for the pocket and attention of teh consumer is seen in this 1931 illustration that was tucked inside this almost-provocatively-named pamphlet, Billboards ad Aesthetic Legislation, New Applications of Police Power (published by the St. Louis Public Library). It is astonishing to think of the vast changes that took place in the remaining American frontier, taking place so quickly–two generations separated the last of the great cattle drives to billboard legislations along auto routes in the western states. 

Fighting for the pennies in the pocket bottoms of the working poor and the middle class is getting to be Old Stuff, an interesting chapter in the History of the Assault on the Attention Span of Human Beings.   

JF Ptak Science Books   Quick Post

In an earlier issue of Nature, back on January 15, 1880, there appeared a wonderful article by Francis Galton that turned out to be one of the earliest treatments of synesthesia. “Visualized Numerals” ¹ concerned (in one aspect)  the mental visualization of the act of doing mathematics. That is to say, what images people formed in their brains as they performed mathematical functions. It was also an illustrated article making it perhaps the first attempt at visualizing a thought process.  

Browsing another issue of Nature for May 6, 1890, there appeared another unusual and related piece, this by  George N. Newton, “Visualized Images Produced by Music” (reproduced below). 

 This was probably nothing new  to a lot of people, least of whom included tone poem composers and others who heard music and experienced color sensations–but this too, like the Galton, was a very early publication on the subject.  Or at least in a reachable, non-trivial, not-obscure publication–there were instances of articles written earlier in the 19th century, though they did not find an audience like that of Nature. Folks have been thinking about color hearing for thousands of years, though not necessarily writing much about it or (later) publishing on it–to these people this article was preaching to the choir, in color.  

Notes:

1. See “A New Class of Scientific Image? Synesthesia, Francis Galton and Picturing Thought”, here.  

See RhythmicLight.com for a reproduction of Bainbridge Bishop’s A Souvenir of the Color Organ (1893).

Also for a good site with many links, see the Center for Visual Music, here.

JF Ptak Science Books     Post 2263

Edison’s name was not a popular item in the average American home before his invention of the phonograph.  It was actually some months later, after the initial announcement in 1877, that Edison became justifiably famous. (The phonograph seems to have been up-and-running by August of 1877, though Edison did not apply for the patent until December of that year, the patent itself being granted in January 1878.) It is difficult today to place the amazement and astonishment that greeted the invention–there was nothing like it, before, ever–except for writing, of course, and then the recording telegraph.  It was a sensational piece of power, being able to record and save sound–and then play it back again.  It was the first time in human history that the auditory sense world could be audibly preserved.

The thing about the earliest phonographs was that the recording were made on tin foil, which meant that the cylinder had a limited lifespan. The use of wax on the cylinder took a few years to come (Edison having moved on to other more interesting ideas like the light bulb rather than mess around with tweeking the phonograph) and following the initial public sensation with the invention in 1878/9 there was not another big rush towards it until the mid-1880’s with the much more durable wax cylinder.  This version not only was more stable and had a far greater shelf life, it was also much easier to use (i.e. record and play), and it was in the late 1880’s that the ideas for the use of the thing really took off.  

I noticed this ad for Mrs. Potts’ “Sad Iron” at the top of the page for something that I wrote the blog-post previous to this one. It is an odd thing, Uncle Sam presenting the Czar with a recording of Mrs. Potts’ irons being shipped his way. (This was a clothing iron, shaped sort of like a boat, made of iron, and fired up on some heat source–Mrs. Potts’ big improvement was to have a detachable handle on the thing.) 

The ad is dated June 1, 1878, which makes it quite an early use of the great new invention, still in the same year as when the thing was patented.  And here it is, a wonder of the age, used to sell irons.  

I wonder about how quickly other great inventions succumbed to trivial notice like this…or perhaps this is more a sign of the instrument’s acceptance into popular culture, and it is actually a measure of the distribution of a great new idea that is so even and complete that six months later the thing is so well known as to be trivial?  Or perhaps this is a peek at a more-modern phenomenon for capturing teh attention of a buying public by using a word that is hyper-popular and in the news and a main point of discussion, like “Atomic Cafe” or “Radium Cakes”?  

I don’t know–just wondering out loud.  

JF Ptak Science Books  Post 2262

In an interesting article in Popular Science Monthly (volume 44, December 1893) Helen Zimmern reviews the work and vision of positivist-criminologist Cesare Lombroso’s Criminal Woman.  Lombroso was a believer in certain bits of investigation and experimentation that he took as science. He examined the physical characteristics of criminals and made aggressive assumptions on how the shared statistics of visual clues could elucidate the character of a person.  He measured all sorts of things in prisoners–head shape, skull capacity, all manner of other body part measurement,s hearing ability, strengths,m weaknesses. color determination, acuity, agility, sagacity of facial features, and on and on, and was fairly well satisfied that he had unlocked a code of criminality determined by mostly visual interpretation–in effect, a naked-eye DNA.  It was certainly in keeping with the time and the belief in New Statistics.  Most of it was bunk, dangerous, and useless.  

IT was all taken as a science of sorts at the time, and Ms. Zimmern reviewed the Lombroso work as a scientific, evidentiary document.  Mostly the conclusion are sad and wilting.

Here’s a bit from the review, followed by a couple of links to other works in English by Lambroso.  

“…on tattooing in women, the tendency to tattoo being, according to Lombroso, an infallible indication of criminal tendencies.”–Cesare Lombroso, “Criminal Woman” review, page 221.