All Questions
Tagged with technology united-states
20 questions
4
votes
1
answer
191
views
US agencies phone numbers in the 1960s-1970s
For those who have a memory of it, I would like to understand the structure of the numbering plans and phone numbers of US agencies in the 1960s-1970s.
In an old congressional phonebook from 1971
I ...
- 143
-3
votes
2
answers
385
views
How did they build tall and heavy stone buildings in the 19th century? [closed]
Lately, I've been watching these videos about how a lot of buildings allegedly built in the mid-to-late 19th century (1800s) look extremely old even on the photos taken when they were supposedly just ...
- 1
25
votes
1
answer
8k
views
How difficult was it to spoof the sender of a telegram in 1890-1920's in USA?
For my current genealogical research, I'm interested in how telegrams were sent inside the USA, in the 1890's through 1920's. I do not have copies of any actual telegrams that were sent or received; ...
- 351
5
votes
1
answer
2k
views
What percentage of US households had electricity and telephones in 1940?
I'm trying to find a published source giving the percent of U.S. households having electricity and percent having telephones in 1940 (+/- a year or two). Not interested in the rural vs city divide per ...
- 153
4
votes
1
answer
287
views
Why does the US have many top-level web domains? [closed]
Why does the US have top-level domains like .gov, .mil and others, while other nations can only use second level domains for their government agencies? It might seem an easy question, but I think it ...
- 53
55
votes
4
answers
9k
views
What do the phone number suffixes J, M, R, W in 1940 New York phone book mean?
Browsing through the Staten Island, NY telephone directory of January 1940, I found that certain phone numbers were printed with a suffix J, M, R or W. What do these mean? I've marked a few of them in ...
- 603
3
votes
2
answers
913
views
How can there be a "final edition" of a morning paper, in the morning?
A US television episode from 1957 has the following scene, set in a hotel restaurant in what is clearly the morning, as he is eating breakfast and it looks brightly lit:
Person: "The morning paper, ...
3
votes
0
answers
403
views
Was Frisbee criticized in the Soviet Union?
In the U.S. of the 1950s, the Space Age and molded plastic flying discs (Frisbees) were both novel. New materials and a supposed resemblance to UFOs made this linkage irresistible for early disc ...
user18968
1
vote
1
answer
375
views
Who made this grandfather clock?
I found this grandfather clock and I was fascinated by its workings. Since this is about history, I'd like to know who made it so I can research the rest. I will upload four pictures of it.
First ...
11
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Why was the US army slow to adopt the use of radar prior to Pearl Harbour?
According to Wikipedia, the US radar station SCR-270 picked up the Japanese approach and reported it, but this report was ignored as the duty officer, who believed the sighting to be American bombers ...
- 108k
6
votes
2
answers
5k
views
How did life change for the average American as a result of the end of World War 1?
Every year, the Daughters of the American Revolution host an essay contest concerning American History. I'll disclose that I'm not a student seeking internet help with the essay, but rather just ...
- 163
1
vote
0
answers
134
views
How do I find out some information about a business in the early 1980s?
I live outside the USA, and I need to find information about a certain "LAMO-LEM Laboratories", I have an address: Box 2382, La Jolla, CA 92038. But that's all. The web has not been kind to me wrt to ...
- 111
7
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Which method of telephone calls was more popular: station-to-station or person-to-person?
My question is related to this question I asked earlier on the cost of a telephone call in the 1920s in the United States of America.
Now, I am interested in the whole period from 1920 until 1960 and ...
- 359
8
votes
3
answers
15k
views
How much did a telephone call cost in the USA around 1920?
I am looking for data on historic telephone call prices in the US between 1920 and 1930. What did it cost to make a call? I know that, back then different rates were charged based on the distance of ...
- 359
15
votes
2
answers
1k
views
How did lecturers magnify their voice in the days before amplification?
I am going to be portraying Mark Twain on the lecture circuit circa 1896.
I want to make the performance as realistic as possible, so that the sufferers (audience) can adopt a "willing suspension of ...
30
votes
1
answer
4k
views
How much were telegraphists in the 1950s paid?
I'm doing some research for a small project, and am having some difficulty finding information on telegraphists as a whole.
The information I'm trying to find is rather specific, and I can't seem to ...
user8194
9
votes
3
answers
829
views
Did the break up of AT & T in 1984 lead to technological innovation?
Are there examples of technologies developed since 1984 that would not have been likely to be developed had the Bell system stayed intact rather than being broken up by the US government?
Let's pose ...
- 25.8k
4
votes
1
answer
854
views
What differences led to Technicolor becoming the dominant color filming technology in Hollywood?
Apparently another technology, Kinemacolor, was invented first in the UK, but it never caught on in Hollywood. Kinemacolor was expensive, and had some other glitches involved, but the fact that it was ...
- 9,675
23
votes
4
answers
2k
views
Is there any evidence to support the claim that the US Strategic Defense Initiative played any significant role in undermining the USSR?
I have been reading Sorrows of Empire by Chalmers Johnson, and one of the things that stuck me was a quote by Soviet hydrogen bomb creator Andrei Sakharov who was released from political imprisonment ...
- 5,795
10
votes
5
answers
3k
views
Why did the United States not seriously develop Anti Aircraft Missiles?
During the Cold War, the United States did not seem to actively develop anti-aircraft missiles
(I know that Wikipedia is not an exhaustive source for lists, but just as a rough estimate, they list ...
user39