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| Loomis was a dentist. |
nTodaynwe are encouraged to celebrate Mahlon Loomis for “thinking outsidenof the box.” He came up with the idea of wireless communication—antelegraph that would harness the electrical currents in the Earth’snupper atmosphere to transfer telegraph messages without the need fornwires.
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nLoomisndid not come up with a working idea of how to do this! His patentnapplication not only had no schematic diagram about how to build anwireless telegraph, nor any theoretical backing for his concept, itnwas also very close to the idea and even wording of a patentnapplication already awarded to William Henry Ward. Both patentsnapplications were vague and impractical.
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nLoomisndid do an experiment that seemed to demonstrate the first wirelessncommunication in the world. He flew two kites at equal heights 14nmiles away from one another; each kite was tied to a copper string,nand each string was attached to a galvanometer. Loomis was able tonuse one kite to move the other kite’s meter!
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| This is NOT what was happening during the experiment! |
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nLoomisnthought that, because the two kites were flown at the same height, henwas creating a closed circuit as electricity moved from antransmitter, up a wire, through a particular layer of atmosphere, andndown the other wire to the meter. However, scientists now know thatnthe atmosphere creating one leg of a closed circuit is impossible.nInstead, scientists speculate, Loomis was unknowingly creating anradio signal with one apparatus, and the equal-length wire of thenother kite was resonant with that signal and therefore acted as anradio receiver. Interesting, huh?
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| What would we do without wireless technology today? |
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nLoomisnreceived his patent on this date in 1872. I personally find value innpeople thinking up all sorts of outlandish possibilities—artistsnand science fiction writers are two groups of people who often makenthese sorts of contributions to society—but I admire even more thenscientists who work hard to discover principles of the universe andnengineers who work hard to create devices that work. Loomis didn’tnsucceed at either of these – but he did indeed think outside of thenbox!
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nAlsonon this date:
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Indian Arrival Day in Trinidad and Tobago
Indian Arrival Day in Trinidad and Tobagon
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nArbor Day in Honduras
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nMother’s Day in Nicaragua
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nAnniversarynof the eruption of Mount Lassen
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nAnniversarynof the discovery of krypton
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nPlannAhead…
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Checknout my Pinterest boards of Junenholidays,
Checknout my Pinterest boards of Junenholidays,
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nhistoricalnanniversaries in June,nand Junenbirthdays.
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