Show eth the e name Is s fa familiar BY F FELIX E LI X 8 and d E ELMO lm SCOTT WATSON solon WHEN HEN we want to say that a man is wise we call him a solon and we call lawmakers solons too this mean that we think all lawmakers are wise men heaven forbid the reason is that the worlds original lawmaker on a big scale was a very wise man and his name was solon that name just a first name or a last name it is all the name the man had and all he needed he lived so long ago that the population was small enough to let men get by with one word names solon was one of the original seven solon golon wise men of greece andaas and was born in athens about B C I 1 he ae wrote or rewrote practically all the laws that were in existence during his time and was the first lawmaker to devise a code that gave people rights instead of merely prohibiting hi them from doing this or saying that they must do that besides regulating private and public life his code reformed the calendar the system of weights and measures the monetary system it relieved the burdens of debtors without curtailing the rights of creditors he could be elected on either ticket today his laws were crudely written on wooden cylinders and set up in public places for everybody to read this must have been just a matter of form because in his day about abou the only ones who could read were the ones who wrote the cylinders belvins Kel vins law THE HE kelvin a commercial unit of electricity belvins Kel vins law for measuring the most economical diameter of an electric wire kelvin or absolute temperature scale which begins at degrees below zero fahrenheit and the belvina tor the first electric refrigerator for household use were named tor for lord kelvin of largs langs scotland one of the greatest and most practical scientists of all time he invented flashing signals tor for lighthouses designed an oil floated self level ing magnetic compass which allowed this instrument to be used on steel ships invented the ultra sensitive ensi tive detect lord kelvin ing g and recording apparatus that made the trans at bantle lantic cable possible reduced temperature pera ture to a mathematical basis and announced absolute zero where there is no heat and where molecules stand still his name was william thomson and he was born in belfast in 1824 the son ot of a professor of mathematics at the royal institution ution of belfast As early as 1853 1852 he foresaw the practicability of heating and cooling buildings by means of currents of air when he built a mansion of his own in 1874 on the scottish coast he built in heating ducts and ventilating facilities when he died in 1907 he had received every degree a scholar could obtain and had made a fortune of many millions of dollars released by western newspaper union |