In this 1956 film by Coronet Instructional Films, INVENTIONS IN AMERICA’S GROWTH, the recollections of Scientific America editor Jonathan Sharpe tell about the Age of Miracles in America. From 1850-1910, innovation and invention shaped American life in dramatic ways. We can follow some of the advances in farming (horse drawn reaper 1:40), see Edison’s phonograph (:14), and the expansion of steel for daily life (street car rails at 2:54 and the high wheeled steel bicycle at 2:40). There are shots of the cover of Scientific America magazine (3:08 and 7:24). Inventors from this era are featured: Alexander Graham Bell and the telephone he displayed at the 1876 Philadelphia Exposition (4:07), interior and exterior shots of Edison’s Menlo Park Laboratory (5:12), the Wright Brother’s Cycle Company shop (7:30), early wind tunnel (7:42) and planes, with some actual footage taken on the new invention of the motion picture camera (7:48). There is footage of Marconi’s wireless telegraph (8:34) and the amplifier tube invented by Lee De Forest (8:53) that made the invention of the radio possible. With the advent of Edison’s electric light bulb (5:28), the use of electricity became more wide-spread (electric generator 5:41) and led to the electric street car (6:07), elevated trains (6:34) and on to some of the early automobiles, some of which were electric (6:18). There is footage of a young mechanic named Henry Ford in his workshop (6:36) and automobiles (6:51).
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