Page:Popular Mechanics 1928 01.pdf/19

 

Using aerial maps to locate tax dodgers has proved successful in five Connecticut towns, according to the department of commerce. In Middletown, the first to have an aerial photographic survey made, 1,896 buildings which were not on the tax lists were disclosed by the map. Seventy-nine stores located on Main street alone were in the list. As a result of the survey, which cost $4,000, the Middletown tax list was raised from $20,500.000 to $31,500,000 and the tax rate reduced from thirty mills to twenty-four mills. Rocky Hill, Conn., increased its tax list from $1,500,000 to $4,000,000 by locating buildings which had escaped taxation, and as a result lowered the tax rate from twenty-two to eight and a quarter mills.

 

Entirely concealed when not in use, and easily extended, a folding automobile bed invented by a southern man is hidden under the rear-seat cushion, when closed, and pulls out over the front seats. It has comfortable springs and keeps the bedding shielded from dust.



 



Built in one summer as the result of a hobby for model construction, a miniature doll house in the form of a castle is proving a source of revenue for its owner, a California man. He charges admission for inspection of the curious three-story abode, and visitors gain access by stooping low under the doorways and squeezing through sidewise. The house was built after he had seen a similar model owned by a friend.

 

Steel collection boxes, resembling the large-size parcel boxes of the post office department, are used by a Nebraska laundry to collect the bundles of its patrons. The boxes are scattered through the city on private property, usually a corner occupied by a gasoline-filling station. They attract laundry customers to the filling stations, and make it convenient for them to deliver their laundry while getting gas service. The laundry-collection wagons make regular rounds, and the finished work is then delivered direct to the customers' homes.

