Through the dark of night, and the heat of day, America's plane spotters
have kept their lonely watch. Theirs is a job without recompense, with
out glory, without even the thrill of danger—yet they have kept to their
posts. But there are times, when the fog rolls in or the skies are dark, that
even the keenest human eyes are not enough. Then, along our shores and
about our cities, we can depend on electronic sentries to scan the skies.)
What is Electronics, Anyway?
1. What is an electron?
The electron is one of the fundamental par
ticles of matter and electricity. Electrons
are part of atoms; atoms make up mole
cules. And molecules, in turn, make up all
the matter in the world, and in the universe
of which the world is but a small part. The
electron is far too small to be seen, even
with the best microscopes. Thirty thousand
trillion trillion electrons would weigh less
than one ounce! Electronics is the science
of electrons.
2. Who discovered electronics?
No one person. Electronics has grown as the
result of the work of many scientists, in
many countries, over the past 60 years. It
is growing faster today than ever before, as
scientists learn more about electrons and
how to use them.
3. What is the difference between an
electronic tube and a radio tube ?
A radio tube is one of the many kinds of
electron tubes. They are as varied as the
jobs they do. Some are small as a thimble,
others big as a man. Some are vacuum tubes,
others contain rare gases. Some are made of
glass, others of steel. New types are being
developed all the time.
4. Is television an electronic
development?
Yes. So is the radio, the X-ray, radar. Elec
tronic tubes work in the long-distance tele
phone; they control important processes in
industry; they count and sort and safe
guard. New uses are being found almost
every day.
5. What does electronics promise for the
future?
Many things. New products and services,
new medical tools to help safeguard human
health. Perhaps equally important, it will
give us a tool by which we can make things
faster, better, and cheaper, so that we can
all afford more of them.
J\ADAR is America’s best plane spotter. Like the
bat, which is equipped by nature with one of the most
remarkable sets of blind-flying “instruments” known to
man, radar can operate “blind” in night and fog. Waves
from electronic tubes, incessantly scanning the skies,
can “feel” through the dark the approach of an enemy
plane.
Radar, and the Spitfires, stopped the Stukas in the
skies over England in 1940. Radar, helping to direct the.;
fire of an American warship in the Pacific, enabled it to
hit a Japanese warship 8 miles away in pitch darkness.
Yet radar is no more mi
raculous than your radio set.
It is simply the application
of principles discovered
many years ago. Many sci
entists and engineers—in this
country and in Britain, some
working alone, some in the
Army and INavy, many in college and industrial re
search laboratories—played a part in its development.
And General Electric was one of the first and most
active in this field.
This was only natural. For, when in 1940 the Navy
requested G. E. to begin the manufacture of radar
equipment, we had been for more than 20 years en
gaged in the development and manufacture of the kind
of electron tubes, circuits, and apparatus that makes
radio, and radar, possible. Additional manufacturing
facilities were started at once. And today, General
Electric is supplying this equipment in quantity for
the Army and the Navy,
Electronics is a Peacetime Science: We know it
best through radio, a great and essential industry. But
electronics works in almost every other industry, too
measuring in millionths of an inch, converting electric
current to heat steel furnaces and to refine aluminum
and magnesium, seeing through inches of steel; protect
ing property and human lives, regulating lighting. And
electronic controls enable women to do many complex
jobs in industry, releasing men for war.
But the destiny of elec
tronics is not to replace—it is
to add to the products and
services we enjoy, and to
make easier our ways of ob
taining them. Things like
television merely await the
war’s end. And in the elec
tronic laboratories ot today are the seeds ot other, ot
new and undreamed-of benefits for tomorrow. General
Electric Company, Schenectady, N. Y.
SOME PEACETIME USES OF ELECTRONIC TUBES
Home Radio
X-Rays
Elevator leveling
Textile, steel, and
paper mill control
Television
J“REE — a 4-page “Primer of Electronics,” ex
plaining the simple principles of electronic
tubes. For your copy write Dept. 6-201, Gen
trd Electric Company, Schenectady, N. Y.
★
The best investment in il'e recall
is in this country’s fuinr.r—
BUY WAR BONUS
YOU ARE INVITED TO LISTEN TO “THE WORLD TODAY” AT 6:45 P. M., EWT, MONDAY THROUGH
SATURDAY, ON CBS, AND THE "HOUR OF CHARM” M P. M., EWT, SUNDAYS, ON NBC.
GENERAL
ELECTRIC
955*IE-ail