Things today's kids missed out on

[smokinbasser]

I didn't go all the way to the beginning of this thread but in the Smokey mountains near Gatlinburg Tn. there is a huge "brood" of fireflies that blink in syncroniziation. I'm not sure how they do it but its a neat display to watch.

 

[Illum]

^^This

 

[Monocrom]

I think they've missed out on that for nearly 3/4 of a century now.

 

[EZO]

No doubt, someone must have mentioned this previously somewhere in this lengthy thread but the other day I was surprised to see a phone booth while doing some business in a small town in NH. It turned out it was just the booth.....the phone had been removed. I'm sure the booth's days are numbered too. So, today's kids will not only miss out on public payphones but also the whole concept of phone booths. Poor Superman, what will he do now? And there will be no place to run and find refuge when the BIRDS attack!

 

[Monocrom]

Plenty of public phones still left on Manhattan island. But no booths. It's interesting to see that at one time, it was just accepted that folks talking on a public telephone wanted and expected some privacy. Nowadays, you get that guy or gal who blabs out loud while practically screaming into her cellphone for everyone to hear. Public payphones are now clustered in small groups or a bank of phones. Talk, and hope that everyone around you or even next to you won't care about what's going on.

 

[EZO]

I'm not surprised that Manhattan still has pay phones. It makes sense. Here in New England you'll see one occasionally but the few left are fast disappearing. Our phone company, Fairpoint (formerly Verizon) has been phasing them out as they see them as not worth the manpower and expense to maintain anymore. We have a beautiful art deco hotel and movie theater that used to have an absolutely gorgeous old fashioned wooden phone booth with an enameled steel telephone sign and "Ma Bell" symbol on it. It's gone now.

So, pay phones but no phone booths in NYC, huh? Clark Kent sure has a problem. :laughing:

 

[Monocrom]

Indeed!

Also, apparently kids (as well as the rest of us) will miss out on Starhalo's old Sig pic.

 

[StarHalo]

Also, apparently kids (as well as the rest of us) will miss out on Starhalo's old Sig pic.

The new sig is a work in progress, but it's evolving nicely. And the thread the previous sig appeared in is locked, so the kids can make do with this copy:

And speaking of pay phones, I always thought the polished stainless steel finish on them would be perfect on a flashlight. I would totally pay extra for the Pay Phone Finish..

 

[EZO]

Never mind.

 

[Laser2012]

Iron pencil box.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Where I live in rural Vermont, every season starting about now, the fireflies come out. Of course, there are no street lights out here. I look out off my deck onto acres of fields and forest and when the conditions are right there are hundreds and hundreds, maybe even thousands flashing simultaneously all around. It is truly magical. If I were a kid I'd be out there with a jar for sure.

Tonight I ran across some mesmerizing photos of fireflies here and it reminded me of this discussion.

 

[Chauncey Gardiner]

While driving to the auto parts store this morning I saw five children jumping up and down in a puddle of water,, thought of this thread and smiled.

~ Chance

 

[EZO]

Where I live in rural Vermont, every season starting about now, the fireflies come out. Of course, there are no street lights out here. I look out off my deck onto acres of fields and forest and when the conditions are right there are hundreds and hundreds, maybe even thousands flashing simultaneously all around. It is truly magical. If I were a kid I'd be out there with a jar for sure.

Tonight I ran across some mesmerizing photos of fireflies here and it reminded me of this discussion.

Those are wonderful images on the link PhotonWrangler. Thanks!

I was looking forward to trying some digital photography of the fireflies on my property this year as it would allow for images like those in the link to be made that simply couldn't be done on film. Unfortunately, we had such a cold early summer that there were hardly an fireflies compared to most years so it wasn't worth the effort. There's always next year.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

The smell of a fresh roll of film as you removed it from it's foil packaging and threaded it into your camera. It was a pretty unique aroma in a sort of chemical-fruity way, and it was the smell of anticipation as you thought about what great moments you might capture with it.

 

[Monocrom]

The smell of a fresh roll of film as you removed it from it's foil packaging and threaded it into your camera. It was a pretty unique aroma in a sort of chemical-fruity way, and it was the smell of anticipation as you thought about what great moments you might capture with it.

I remember that smell. Yeah, that was a nice one ...

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Electric buses. I'm not talking about the current crop of battery powered vehicles but buses that ran on a pair of overhead electrical wires. Riding one was an adventure. At the main intersections, there were junctions and insulators in the overhead wires to allow cross-traffic electric buses to pass through the intersection and maintain power, and the conductor rods on the busses would spark like crazy and the interior lights would flicker as it hit those junctions. And every now and then one of the metal conductor rods on the roof would jump off the wire, bringing the bus to a complete stop. The driver would have to get out and use a long stick to gingerly maneuver the rod back onto the overhead wire, usually with lots of sparks, and then the lights would come back on and the journey would resume. Those conductor rods mounted on the roof had a pivoting mount which allowed the rods to follow the overhead wires (usually) even when the bus was turning into and out of the curb lane. It was interesting to see those things in action.

As a little tyke standing on the sidewalk watching these buses with all of the angry sparks flying, it looked fascinating and almost cataclysmic at times. I was in awe of the bravery of those drivers when they had to fix the overhead conductors! And I always wondered what voltage they operated on.

Edit: Apparently Seattle still uses some electric buses. The ones in my old neighborhood looked like this.

 

[will]

Electric buses. I'm not talking about the current crop of battery powered vehicles but buses that ran on a pair of overhead electrical wires. Riding one was an adventure.

Trollies ... ...

 

[Chauncey Gardiner]

Being raised by two parents.

~ C.G.

 

[degarb]

Electric buses. I'm not talking about the current crop of battery powered vehicles but buses that ran on a pair of overhead electrical wires. Riding one was an adventure. At the main intersections, there were junctions and insulators in the overhead wires to allow cross-traffic electric buses to pass through the intersection and maintain power, and the conductor rods on the busses would spark like crazy and the interior lights would flicker as it hit those junctions. And every now and then one of the metal conductor rods on the roof would jump off the wire, bringing the bus to a complete stop. The driver would have to get out and use a long stick to gingerly maneuver the rod back onto the overhead wire, usually with lots of sparks, and then the lights would come back on and the journey would resume. Those conductor rods mounted on the roof had a pivoting mount which allowed the rods to follow the overhead wires (usually) even when the bus was turning into and out of the curb lane. It was interesting to see those things in action.

As a little tyke standing on the sidewalk watching these buses with all of the angry sparks flying, it looked fascinating and almost cataclysmic at times. I was in awe of the bravery of those drivers when they had to fix the overhead conductors! And I always wondered what voltage they operated on.

Edit: Apparently Seattle still uses some electric buses. The ones in my old neighborhood looked like this.

What year was this? The electric motor delivers full torque at 1 mph, great for hilly areas.

People complained at the unsightly tangle of wires-a real plus for your squirrel avatar. I often have pondered the possibilities of using such a wire system to power my headlamps at work, ditching the battery pack in favor of an antenna.

"Moreover, some cities, like Calgary, Alberta, run their light rail networks using wind energy,[10] which is effectively emission-free once the turbines are built and installed. Other cities, Vancouver, B.C., for instance, use hydroelectricity. A further advantage of trolleybuses is that they can generate electricity from kinetic energy while braking, a process known as regenerative braking. However, for regenerative braking to work as such, there must be another bus on the same circuit that needs power, or a way to send the excess power back to the commercial electric power system"

 

[Lampbeam]

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