Radio Cinema

"I suppose," mused Secretary Wilbur of the U. S. Navy, "we'll be sitting up at our desks during the next war and watching the battle in progress." It was in the downtown office of a Washington D. C, inventor, one C. Francis Jenkins (TIME, Apr. 20) and besides the Secretary, there were other high Government officials present. All wer watching a small cinima screen where a little dark cross was slowly revolving in a spot of light. The cross was not very clear, but allegedly distinct enough to mark an important step in radio photography, for that was what it was. The cross was caused by a toy Dutch windmill moving in a beam of light at an old naval radio station near Anacostia, D. C, several miles out of the capital. Eight feet from the windmill was a photosensitive apparatus, called by Inventor Jenkins the "radio eye," consisting of a battery of mirrors and a photoelectric cell. The flashes into which the windmill's motion were broken up by the mirrors were reproduced for projection at the receiving end by another photosensitive cell.

Transmission of pictures by ordinary telegraph (TIME, Apr. 7, 1923) has reached such practical perfection that, according to an announcement last week by the American Telephone and Telegraph Co., banks have been experimenting with it for transmitting out-of-town checks. If successful, the device would enable a man presenting, for example, a Boston check in San Francisco, to have his signature telephotographed to his home bank, verified, guaranteed by return wire inside of an hour or so.