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Show Meet M&JeJieVmz, tAe iKiieeMmmiiemi Mlmi A : ; ' ::v. :: - l ',::':';:. ; . .:.:,.:.,:. : : -. - ,- i : :;y -..: Wf. - : .-.' . ..: it-: . :' ,' .s, i l' . i . I V. V " ' v. : -' j V-' i , 1 . ; : - ? i 1 J ''V ' " 'liP TM.KING ' " !J '--'','M' WITH MR.TELEVOX ... - VTV ! ' ' , . " 5 y : ' 1 . MR.TEi.EY0XTHE D!51LUMASTEF?. MR..TELEVOX'S LARYNX T 2v Above: Mr. Wensley speaks with "Mr. Televox!" Like a perfect gentleman, gentle-man, the Westinghouse automaton responds re-sponds in a smooth, well-articulated voice. The ability to talk is r.ewiy acquired, ac-quired, for "Mr. Televox" is less than a year old. Unlike human beings, he has an external "larynx," which is the large box at the right. The "vocal chord" is composed of voice oscillations oscilla-tions recorded on a movie film in the box. Lower left: (International News-reel News-reel Photo) "Mr. Televox" further demonstrated his manifold uses when he put a section of the Firct battalion, Sixteenth infantry, stationed at Governors Gov-ernors island, New York city, through a portion of the manual of arms recently. re-cently. Lower right: Here is the "larnyx" cf "Mr. Televox," the Westinghouse mechanical man. Mr. Wensley, inventor inven-tor of the automaton, seems puzzled as he looks over the "vocal chord," which is nothing but a movie film of voice oscillations. Perhaps he wonders won-ders whether the language is absolutely absolute-ly fit and proper for reproduction before be-fore ladies. Or maybe he merely is wondering how he can get this huge "vocal organ" into the windpipe of "Mr. Televox." ITnlike human beings, Mr. Televox never suffers from colds. i By ELMO SCOTT WATSOM nZsT?!" HKBH is an old story C about a man who went to a circus, and when he saw a giraffe for n the first time in his .-pwiryff-rTS life, exclaimed : "There Vf:y7i ain't no such animal. h5&rC A fow ye;u'i' flg0' i you had told the aver- LuL-U-iJJ jige American that there could be developed devel-oped a mechanical "man" of steel and Iron who could be told to perform per-form certain tasks and would d them, his reply would probably be similar to the exclamation of the old fellow who saw his first giraffe. And yet the ingt'uu'.ty of an American inventor in-ventor has developed such a man, but what is more remarkable still is the fact that he has given his automaton a "voice." and it can now "talk back!" IX you are inclined to say "There ain't no such man '." meet "Mr. Televox" and his inventor, 15. J. Wensley of the Westinghouse Klectric and Manufacturing Manufac-turing company ! When Mr. Wensley first brought his mechanical "man" into being, all that "he" could do was to obey certain commands to accomplish certain specified speci-fied results, "lie" could be called upon up-on the telephone and would open and close switches and record the condition condi-tion of instruments or mechanisms with which "he" was connected. But now Mr. Wensley has given him a "larynx," and the process can be reversed, so that if a report becomes necessary "Mr. TeL'vox's" mechanical arm lifts the receiver of a telephone and his "voice" says "This- is Televox calling Main 0100." After the telephone connection con-nection is made, the "conversation" (albeit a prearranged one) is continued contin-ued until certain information is conveyed. con-veyed. As to ho v "Mr. Te'evox" has "found bis voice." it can best be explained in the words of Mr. Wensley himself, who says : To sive tho mp-.-.ar.ism rr.fras for emitting nrti-'alpto s:-ie-h nf (rood quality, use is minle of tloveloivnei-.t in the ''talking l-eovio" industry. A piece of mov:r.'.r picture film abeut 1" or feet long' is .snlieea ti make an endless loop. la the present model two sentences p.re spoken. These are photographed near the two ed;res of the standard f.':n, the rest of it beinjr left blank. The sound appears in the form of closely spaced lines of various shades and v'.d;hs ar.d frequency. Individual In-dividual lamps with special straight filament are arranged with lenses to concentrate the lisht on a very nar- the meantime the person at the distant end has heard the number of the telephone tele-phone to which he has been connected and should it be a wrong number, will be able to hang up and signal the operator op-erator again to get the correct number num-ber However, should the dispatcher have made this call with the expectation expec-tation of operating something in the substation, he listens for the voice and as soon as he has verified the correctness correct-ness of the number of the substation as indicated by the telephone number, he blows a blast on the proper whistle and the voice ceases and the machine is then in condition for further operation opera-tion by means of the whistle notes. Should a circuit breaker open automatically, auto-matically, the Televox is put into action ac-tion and lifts the receiver of the tele- j phone and immediately begins saying at intervals, "This is the Televox calling call-ing for Main 5000." This will be continued con-tinued at intervals until the central operator is able to complete the connection con-nection to the dispatcher's telephone. As soon as he hears this voice, he will step it by a blast of the proper whistle and then proceed to question the machine ma-chine by further whistles as to what nas happened. The answers to these questions will be in the buzzer code which the dispatcher understands. As soon as the whistle stops the oice, the motor is also stopped and the lamps extinguished so that the Him is in use only a very short time. While the usefulness of "Mr. Televox" Tele-vox" is at present restricted to operation oper-ation in the field of telephony, this newest development has great significance. sig-nificance. For, as Mr. Wensley says, -'The addition of this automatic voice considerably broadens the possible Held of application for the Televox. It is not limited to the speaking of the two sentences but may be made to answer quite a number of questions correctly when necessity for such answers an-swers has been determined in advance. For instance, where it is not desired to use code signals indicating the amount of water in the reservoir, this mechanism can be made to state the height of water in feet, or it can be made to say that machine is cool or a machine is hot, or a machine is dan- j gerously hot. It can be made to re- i petit any sort of routine report that i can be selected by electrical circuits." j (.Vn.ddoring what has already been j accomplished in the development of j this automaton, it would be a rash j person indeed who would venture to i predict now what the future limita- ' Hons in oilier fiei'.'.s of usefulness for "Mr. Televox" raid his "children" will he. For, more and more, we are learn- ing how foolish is any declaration of j "It can't be done!" when American in- I venrive gonitis sets- about to prove That i It can, no matter what "it" may be. ! row portion of the film at any one time. A small motor drives the film whenever when-ever the voice is required. A selecting1 mechanism in the televox lights either one of the two lamps depending' upon the sentence desired. The image of tPe filament is projected through a narrow nar-row slot onto the speech record thrnusr'.i which it passes to a photo-cell. A photocell photo-cell passes cm rent directly in proportion propor-tion to the amount of light falling on it. As the lines on the film pass in front of the light, the corresponding chnnrre of currents which take plap in the photo-cell are amplified through a special shielded three stage ampli-1 ampli-1 fior to a volume sufficient to operate a s;nn 1! laud sport ker. This speaker is Priced in front of the telephone transmitter trans-mitter and is hen rd by the p.?rsnn p. the other end of the telephone line ex a. lly as though a human h-vr.t: weie speaking the words into the transmitter. trans-mitter. "When a call is put through to a substation sub-station equipped v.th a Televox hiiv-inar hiiv-inar this voice attachment, the person at the remote end will hear a vnictr soying, '"Televox speaking at r.andolf n 6400." This T.:il repeat a second ti:ve and if the proper signal is not given by means of whistles or other musical devices, the Televox will then hang up the receiver upon the assumption th-U the call is a wrong number call. In |
