Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 91.djvu/44

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��Silent Music"— A Hospital Recreation

A wireless system conveys the melodies to those who want to hear without disturbing those who don't

���Suffrage reports by- wireless. The contri- vance on the left is the receiving set with a few feet of "aerial"

Below: The telephone sending station. By- throwing a switch a voice transmitter is cut into the system to allow the operator to announce the record titles

��A CHICAGO concern has come forward with a "silent music" contrivance that is designed to furnish recreation to inmates of hospitals. With this system installed in a hospital, a continuous and noiseless program of music can be fur- nished. Each patient may decide for him- self or herself whether or not to listen, and if the decision is against such recrea- tion, the patient is not disturbed in any manner.

Briefly stated, the mechanism consists of a phonograph attached to a telephone transmitter, which in turn is hooked up to an electrical wiring system that reaches each private room and each bed in the wards. At each wall outlet a watch-case telephone receiver is wired in. The patient desiring to hear the musical program simply lifts this receiver to his ear.

The sending station equipment is located at the office or in any convenient room, and consists, as stated, of an ordinary phonograph, electrically driven, holding the turntable, which carries any disk record. Attached to this machine is a special music transmitter, consisting of a combination of a telephone transmitter with a vibrating diaphragm and needle. The needle, following the groove of the record, energizes the diaphragm of the transmitter, which in turn energizes the telephone attached thereto.

Beside the transmitting apparatus is a control box, containing electrical resist-

���ances, which energize the transmitting apparatus properly, and binding posts for all connections.

By throwing a switch, a voice transmitter is cut into the system. This enables the operator to announce the names of the records about to be played, to give baseball scores, recitations, war news, and whatever other items may be of interest to his tele- phone clientele.

Except when this voice transmitter is being used, there is no noise of any descrip- tion connected with the sending apparatus beyond a light scratching of the needle, for no tone arm or horn is used.

When installing this system in hospitals in the course of erection, the wiring is made to connect the sending station equip- ment with outlet jacks at the bedsides. These outlets are all connected in multiple on a single pair of wires, carried along with the regular telephone or signal system.

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