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Show Glass 'Ornaments' Save Lives in War If you talk about prisms, Grandma Grand-ma might think you mean the glass ornaments decorating her chan delier. But her grandson, if he's a G.I. Joe, is aware of the fact that solid gloss prisms have been the means of saving many lives during the war. It was early In the war that the army wanted a tank periscope superior supe-rior to the old-style type made of mirrors and flat glass windows. As a result, glass technicians here developed de-veloped a new plate glass prism that supplied about a 50 per cent increase in-crease in visibility. And equally, if not more Important, this superiority was achieved in a unit that could be mass-produced to take care of the desperate need for prisms, traditionally tradition-ally turned out in small quantities by the precise handicraft methods of the optical industry. When the first U. S. tanks went into I combat, however, a great need tor prismatic viewing blocks developed. In those first tanks, commanders had to stand in the hatch, exposed to sniper fire If they wanted a full view of their surroundings. An alarming number were killed. The answer was a new type of bullet-resisting bullet-resisting viewing panel developed by Llbbey-Owens-Ford Glass company. Made of laminated plate glass, the tank observation panels are so placed that tank crews and com manders are enabled to obtain 360 degree field of vision when in action without having to open the hatch to see "what's going on." The prismatic pris-matic viewing blocks utilize for the first time the refractive properties of plate glass to obtain a periscopic. Some Indication of the Importance of these prisms might be gleaned from the number thus fsr turned out by the glass concern. To date, more than 2,000,000 have been produced tor various instruments of war. |