Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 91.djvu/263

 Popular Science Monthly

Alas! It Will Not Work— This Method of Foiling Bomb-Droppers

AND now come Mary Hannah . Clarke, born Ashton, -v

banker and British citizen but residing at Paris, France, andMr.DemetrioMaggiora, engineer and Italian subject but residing in the same city, with a new invention. These two secured sole American rights to an anti- airplane ordnance of the most flab- bergasting construction. This ordnance is light of weight — very light, and might be erected on the roof of a house without interfering with insurance and building regulations.

When the hostile aircraft is di- rectly over the house, this remarkable sheet-iron gun is fired and sends aloft gi- gantic whirling rings of combustion gases which twist the air- craft around, as a cy- clone the oak tree in its path, and forthwith sends it spinning in desperate curves pre- cipitately to the hard pavement below. Whereafter Maggiora and Mrs. Clarke go down the stairs and view the remains with lively and mutual satisfaction at their joint ingenuity.

Witness the accom- panying drawing. The little thing to the right is the generator of the powerful gas. The gas is admitted by a valve to the explosion cham- ber below in the smoke- stack-gun where it is mixed with air. The choke port above this chamber looks scientific and perhaps has other merits. The charge is ignited by electric spark, of course.

And now notice the precautions taken for successful operation. The long tube which is supposed to endure the

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��explosion from within might collapse from the pressure of the atmosphere when a vacuum is suddenly created inside of it by the eruptive dis- charge of its contents. Hence a series of large valves ' spirally. They open automat- es ically and admit the air to the vacuum gradually and soft-
 * are arranged

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��BARREL

���The tornado-spurting gun and its gas gener- ator in operation on a housetop. At right above is a diagram of the contrivance

���The ordinary policeman's club with a whistle in the handle. The whistle is concealed by a cap which flies back automatically

��The Policeman's "Billy" Becomes a Whistle

THE inventors have discov- ered that the or- dinary hardwood club of the police- man is not so effi- cient as it looks.

James A. Byrne, of West Orange, N. J., has been struck by the fact that when an officer clutches a prisoner with one hand and his club with the other, he is not in a position to take his whistle from his pocket. Mount a whistle on the end of his club and the problem is solved, whistle is inserted in the handle of
 * lub ; an opening near the top per-

mits the escape of air when the whistle is blown. Both the neck and the mouthpiece of the whis- tle project beyond the handle end of the club, but they are concealed from view by a cap held in position by a spring catch. If the police- man wishes to blow the whistle in an emergen- cy, he presses a push button and the cap flies back, exposing the whistle to view.

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