"I call for drama for E's scientific assistance," Davis announced as he put a piece of paper into the air. "I threw away this heavy scientific paper as a symbol of breaking away from convention."
Outstanding engineers and scientists then took to the stage to show their inventions, plus some dramatic "rough magic". Charles G. Albert, secretary of the Smithsonian Museum, explained how his "solar cooker" uses solar energy. RCA scientist Vladimir K. Zworykin showed his imaging mirror, which made "the invisible" possible. In the last paragraph, a local actress wore a white acetate crepe evening dress and a Celanese velvet coat. This handicraft in the history of science was invented by chemist Arthur D. Little in 192 1 year. Animal parts are made into gelatin, spun into thread, then dyed and woven into handbags.
RCA inventor and engineer Vladimir Koichi Zworykin (1888- 1982) showed his photoelectric microscope, which can observe ultraviolet and infrared rays that are usually invisible to the naked eye. (Smithsonian Institution Archives, picture number SIA2010-161) Participants held a "patent dinner" at the Mayflower Hotel that night. When 1 100 guests entered the candlelight hall, Charles F. Kettering, the executive of General Motors ("the boss"), waved in front of a photoelectric battery, and the room was filled with 60,000-watt incandescent lamps.
The banquet includes "food, digest, evaluation, drinks and sugar", such as irradiated milk, fresh frozen lobster and Lima beans. Party gifts include bakelite cigar boxes and an elaborate menu, which lists the patent numbers of everything on the table, including "Yeol de' pat' pending" sherry.
The Planning Committee actually met a few weeks ago to taste test the products to be provided (and promote them in advance). Washington post wrote that these diners "ate and drank boldly", but when they drank cocktails, they were told that the mixture had been patented for non-cooking purposes, but it showed a "light green sign". The hair tonic of Friedrich William Emile Muller (U.S. Pat. No.93943 1) contains "40% best corn whisky distilled harmlessly, 20% port wine, 25% cooked blackcurrant and 10% water. . . As the Post observed, after "another dose of fortifier", the subjects "didn't seem to care". "
Watson Davies, Director of Scientific Services (1896- 1967) and Thomas Migueli, Chemical Engineer of General Motors (1889- 1944), holding rakes,19361. (fremont Davis, Smithsonian Institution Archives, picture number SIA2008-609 1) At the banquet, "KDSP" exhibited a replica of McCormick Lip and a 1903 Cadillac. An antique phonograph, a new Hammond organ and a patented "pocket violin" provide background music during meals. Other entertainment activities include the radio broadcast on the Eastern Airlines plane hovering over Washington, the phonograph recording of the late Thomas Alva Edison, and Samuel F.B. Morse's original telegraph receiver borrowed by Western Union from Cornell University to transmit "everything God has done". The table is decorated with hybrid (and patented) flowers, including "Good Times" (red) and "Lady Franklin D. Roosevelt" (light pink) roses. After dinner, the guests staggered to the ballroom to participate in the annual dance of the Patent Office Association ... Four years later,
Caitlin presided over another invention celebration, this time commemorating the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Patent Law1. Davis once again helped plan this project and arranged a promotion "test" dinner on April Fool's Day of 1940.
There are more patented foods at the Mayflower Hotel banquet, such as "telegraph soup" made of macaroni "dotted line" instead of alphabet letters. This time, the beverage in the advertisement is Joshua T. Smith's "snake bite therapy" (obtained U.S. patent numbers 379 183 and 1888), and it is changed into a mixture of whisky and port wine instead of the original patented formula of alcohol, gallbladder and rattlesnake grass, alum and iodine.
General Motors chemical engineer Thomas Migueli Jr. (1889- 1944), Science Service physics editor Robert Porter (1905- 1978) and General Motors CEO Charles Franklin Kettering (1876). (fremont Davies, Smithsonian Institution Archives, picture number: SIA2010-192)1940 In the spring, the cloud of war was spreading all over the world. Davis and his boxing gloves held a week-long "invention parade" exhibition in the auditorium of the US Department of Commerce, and hosted a banquet for a company. More than 40,000 visitors saw historical relics (such as abraham lincoln's handwritten patent applications and models), including the Smithsonian's collection of 300 items and consumer goods (the razor display includes a "beard mirror" showing the growth of chin and beard), but most of the exhibitions involved industrial productivity and military potential. For example, Glenn L. Martin provided the nose part of the 167-F bomber, and in the same year, Watson Davis devoted himself to his scientific photo parade. In that book and exhibition manual, he tried to use an optimistic tone. However, the scientific parade is moving along a new route. By the summer of 1940, Kettering, Davis and other members of the National Inventors Committee were ordered to collect examples of private inventions and try to guide useful ideas for the coming war.
A version of this article first appeared in "General Situation" and was published by the Smithsonian Institution Archives.