By G. E. Shuman
Okay, yes, I saw the funny shaped truck parked on the sidewalk in front of Barre City Hall a few Thursdays ago. (I think it was the 16th.) Did you see it too? I planned to go back and ask the people of the truck a few questions about it the next day, but, alas, they were gone with the wind by then. Gone with the wind probably came to mind just now because of the depictions of commercial windmills on the truck. I’m not sure.
One of the questions I would have asked, if I had the chance, would have been about the ‘why’ of it all. That is, the ‘why’ of why Barre City allowed their truck to be parked ON the sidewalk all day, and even supplied city wooden barricades to, presumably, stop other people from parking there as well. I would have also asked the truck people why they had the word Greenpeace painted on the truck. Was the truck owned by Greenpeace? I really wish I had stopped to talk to them on Thursday. Also, why was the truck painted with the suggestion to: "Close Vermont Yankee"?
The truck was a really odd looking thing. It was an Isuzu flat bed sort of truck, with a big white, propaganda-laden, slanted-roof box on the back. I happened to pass city hall a few times that Thursday, and did notice that the purpose of the slanted roof was to hold a whole roof-full of solar collection panels. These, obviously, were not there to power the truck, and could no more have done so than the painted windmills on the sides of it could have. They were there to advertise, to propagandize, to promote solar and wind power; which are two power sources I have nothing at all against, by the way. The thing I didn’t appreciate was that the truck also had that darned sign which said we should close Vermont Yankee. No, I didn’t appreciate that very much at all.
You see, I don’t see the problem with Vermont Yankee. Please know right now that the person writing this column believes in nuclear power. Truthfully, I think it should power everything from our homes and cars to our wrist watches and electric toothbrushes, but that’s just me. As far as I know, good old Vermont Yankee has sat right there in Vernon, producing power, for quite a few years now, and has caused me no trouble at all in the process. I think I would have asked the truck people what they had against Vermont Yankee. I thought they liked non-polluting sources of energy. Or do they only like certain ones? If by then they had not begun hurling compost at me, as some anti-nuclear types did to federal nuclear regulators in Brattleboro recently, (Compost throwing? I thought only chimpanzees did that.) I would then have asked if they knew exactly how many people have been killed by accidents at the Vermont Yankee power plant. I think that answer would have been zero. Then I would have asked how many fatal accidents, or radiation-releasing accidents of any kind have ever occurred at nuclear plants in our country. Barring a near accident at the Three Mile Island plant in 1979, I believe the answer to this would have been zero, also. This fact alone is pretty amazing to me, since our government hasn’t allowed the building of any modern nuclear plants since that time. I also might have asked them how many people have been killed by accidents with windmills in our country. I’m pretty sure that answer wouldn’t have been zero.
I understand the gallant efforts of many of our citizens to free our country from dependence on foreign oil, and I support those efforts wholly. I’m just not sure that turning our backs on that other clean, non-polluting, powerful alternative; nuclear power, is the right way to go.
Speaking of power, I would like to ask, someone, how many windmill farms and solar arrays it would take to supply the energy generated by Vermont Yankee today, and at what expense to construct them. I would also ask where these massive wind and sun farms should be built. One question I would not have to ask is who the people are who would likely complain about the windmills the first time a big flock of Canadian geese got decapitated as they migrated, in a huge V for Vermont, through them. It certainly wouldn’t be Vermont hunters. They would be there with big knives and freezer bags. Also, the people who would complain about the unsightliness of hundreds of huge windmills and solar arrays would not be Vermont farmers. They have been accustomed to acres of barns, silos, farm machinery and even windmills for many years now. No, the complainers would likely be the same people who coined the term ‘light-pollution’ in an effort to slow the economic engine of our cities and shopping centers at night. They might be some of the same people who are proposing the closing of Vermont Yankee. I don’t know if they would be compost hurlers or not.
As I recall the truck parked on the sidewalk on Main Street that Thursday, it brings to mind one more question. I would like to ask Barre City officials if it would be okay for me to park a truck there, ON the sidewalk, laden with wood-stoves, oil burners and a sign which read: ‘Up with Vermont Yankee! Or: Greenpeace Trucks Burn Stinking Diesel!’ Or my favorite: ‘Nuke the Whales’. (By the way, that last one was a joke. Geezzz… grow a sense of humor. Will ya?) I would also appreciate the loan of all those city-owned barricades. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
It’s interesting to me that an Isuzu truck, which was made in Japan, (Sorry Detroit), goes around burning it’s carbon-laden fuel, not to simply promote alternative energy sources, or even bring loads of organic produce to the ol’ co-op, but to denigrate a huge, Vermont-based, power-producing, job-supplying, pollution-free business.
Yes, oddly as it seems, I am all for clean energy, but also believe that nuclear power is safe. If I could have a little reactor in my basement that would supply all my power needs I would get one, today. It would be nice to shut my oil burner down for good, get rid of all those unsightly cables and poles we have become accustomed to seeing along our streets these past hundred years or so, (wire pollution) and still be able to plug an electric car in at night. (Look up at the wires on your street. I bet you hadn’t even noticed how ugly they are.) I also believe that wind and solar power are good, but not good enough yet. If Vermont Yankee is closed down before its time, and replaced by windmill farms and solar panel fields, we might be in for trouble on the first calm day, as night approaches. If you dabble in the stock market, here’s a tip. It might be time to sell Vermont Yankee… and buy Yankee Candle.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Friday, April 10, 2009
Crystal Radio
By G. E. Shuman
The boy of ten years or so lay in his bed, in his room, in his home, in the small rural Maine town. It was late at night in whichever season it was, in that year, whichever year it was, about forty five or so years ago. The child loved these late night moments of solitude. Being one of six children in a very small home, he was fortunate to have even this time of quiet, and more fortunate to have his own room. The room, like the quiet, was never something he could count on having for long.
In these late and silent, slightly eerie moments, the boy loved the chance to listen to a magical device; his crystal radio. The radio was a simple thing he had built himself, of thin wire and a few parts from the store. He had read instructions for making the radio in several places. One was his Cub Scout manual; another was a project book from the library. Several facts about the boy’s crystal radio never ceased to amaze him. The first was the very idea that he had made it himself, of a toilet paper tube, a spool of hair-thin, shellac coated copper wire, a strip of metal from a vegetable can, a cheap plastic ear phone, and a grain-of-rice sized strange part called a germanium diode. These items, when wired together correctly and mounted on a small square of wood, really did make a radio. And it was not just ANY radio. It was a crystal radio. That was the second, nearly mystical fact about the thing that amazed the child. His simple device employed a crystal to make it work. The crystal was in that tiny glass germanium diode, and it was something to be marveled at, by a child of ten years or so, those forty five or so years ago. Yes, those strange words; crystal, germanium, earphone, diode… all together made a working radio, and HE had made it. Another mysterious fact about the radio was that it required no source of power to be supplied by the boy. It did not plug into the wall, and used no batteries. It had no on/off switch, as it never had to be turned off. It looked like a small piece of wood, with a toilet tissue tube and some wires mounted upon it, exactly as it was, and it worked.
Night after night, the small boy of ten years or so waited up late to hear the broadcasts through the radio he had made. He would move that piece of tin-can-tin, slowly across the coil of tube-wound wire, and tune in words and songs that no one else in the house could hear. In the dark of those late and eerie nights, it was impossible to know from how far away the words and the music came. Some signals were from the very next town, but others had bounced off clouds and flown across many miles, to be received by the thin antenna wire stretched around the small boy’s little room, and detected by that tiny germanium crystal diode. The boy imagined that, if he listened intently enough, some night he might even hear a voice or a tone from much further away, as some alien world called out to the only earthly ear that would listen… his.
By now you have certainly supposed that the small boy in the story above was me, and if so, you would be right. In my childhood I made several crystal radios. One was built into a get well card, (perhaps the world’s first musical card,) which I presented to my dad in his hospital bed after he had undergone some surgery or other. In those days there were no TV’s in hospitals. Imagine that. Dad had actually passed some time listening to the little radio. At least he later made me believe he had. My very first crystal radio was even more basic than the ones described above. The only true radio part it contained was the little plastic earphone. It lacked even the crystal diode. In the diode’s place, believe it or not, was a Gillette blue-blade razor blade, tacked onto the piece of wood. A large, bent safety pin detected the radio signal when scratched across the surface of the blade. I have always been a minimalist. To me, less is almost certainly more. Those years ago it both surprised and greatly pleased me, and still does, that some wire, a razor blade and a safety pin could, and still can be used to produce a perfectly acceptable quality of radio reception. The sound was just fine, and literal music to my ears.
You may wonder why I have put you through all this talk of my youthful, geeky obsession with crystal radios. Many adults and certainly most children have never even heard of them. My reason is that I have recently re-discovered the radios, and my obsession, on eBay. (Some people just never grow up.)
One evening last week, I learned, through a casual conversation with one of my adult daughters, that my seven year old grandson, Jackson, loves putting things together. "He’s especially interested in anything electronic," Chrissy confided in me. She had to say no more.
The package from the eBay seller arrived on my doorstep yesterday afternoon. This evening Jackson and I have some serious assembling to do.
Get in Shape this year
The boy of ten years or so lay in his bed, in his room, in his home, in the small rural Maine town. It was late at night in whichever season it was, in that year, whichever year it was, about forty five or so years ago. The child loved these late night moments of solitude. Being one of six children in a very small home, he was fortunate to have even this time of quiet, and more fortunate to have his own room. The room, like the quiet, was never something he could count on having for long.
In these late and silent, slightly eerie moments, the boy loved the chance to listen to a magical device; his crystal radio. The radio was a simple thing he had built himself, of thin wire and a few parts from the store. He had read instructions for making the radio in several places. One was his Cub Scout manual; another was a project book from the library. Several facts about the boy’s crystal radio never ceased to amaze him. The first was the very idea that he had made it himself, of a toilet paper tube, a spool of hair-thin, shellac coated copper wire, a strip of metal from a vegetable can, a cheap plastic ear phone, and a grain-of-rice sized strange part called a germanium diode. These items, when wired together correctly and mounted on a small square of wood, really did make a radio. And it was not just ANY radio. It was a crystal radio. That was the second, nearly mystical fact about the thing that amazed the child. His simple device employed a crystal to make it work. The crystal was in that tiny glass germanium diode, and it was something to be marveled at, by a child of ten years or so, those forty five or so years ago. Yes, those strange words; crystal, germanium, earphone, diode… all together made a working radio, and HE had made it. Another mysterious fact about the radio was that it required no source of power to be supplied by the boy. It did not plug into the wall, and used no batteries. It had no on/off switch, as it never had to be turned off. It looked like a small piece of wood, with a toilet tissue tube and some wires mounted upon it, exactly as it was, and it worked.
Night after night, the small boy of ten years or so waited up late to hear the broadcasts through the radio he had made. He would move that piece of tin-can-tin, slowly across the coil of tube-wound wire, and tune in words and songs that no one else in the house could hear. In the dark of those late and eerie nights, it was impossible to know from how far away the words and the music came. Some signals were from the very next town, but others had bounced off clouds and flown across many miles, to be received by the thin antenna wire stretched around the small boy’s little room, and detected by that tiny germanium crystal diode. The boy imagined that, if he listened intently enough, some night he might even hear a voice or a tone from much further away, as some alien world called out to the only earthly ear that would listen… his.
By now you have certainly supposed that the small boy in the story above was me, and if so, you would be right. In my childhood I made several crystal radios. One was built into a get well card, (perhaps the world’s first musical card,) which I presented to my dad in his hospital bed after he had undergone some surgery or other. In those days there were no TV’s in hospitals. Imagine that. Dad had actually passed some time listening to the little radio. At least he later made me believe he had. My very first crystal radio was even more basic than the ones described above. The only true radio part it contained was the little plastic earphone. It lacked even the crystal diode. In the diode’s place, believe it or not, was a Gillette blue-blade razor blade, tacked onto the piece of wood. A large, bent safety pin detected the radio signal when scratched across the surface of the blade. I have always been a minimalist. To me, less is almost certainly more. Those years ago it both surprised and greatly pleased me, and still does, that some wire, a razor blade and a safety pin could, and still can be used to produce a perfectly acceptable quality of radio reception. The sound was just fine, and literal music to my ears.
You may wonder why I have put you through all this talk of my youthful, geeky obsession with crystal radios. Many adults and certainly most children have never even heard of them. My reason is that I have recently re-discovered the radios, and my obsession, on eBay. (Some people just never grow up.)
One evening last week, I learned, through a casual conversation with one of my adult daughters, that my seven year old grandson, Jackson, loves putting things together. "He’s especially interested in anything electronic," Chrissy confided in me. She had to say no more.
The package from the eBay seller arrived on my doorstep yesterday afternoon. This evening Jackson and I have some serious assembling to do.
Get in Shape this year
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)