Comments on: In the Archives: Lightning Rod for Swindles

By: Irene Hieber

Irene Hieber — Wed, 06 Mar 2013 16:27:52 +0000

Looks like a schematic for a crank telephone.

Irene Hieber

By: Jim Rees

Jim Rees — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 17:07:32 +0000

To be fair, I think Cosmonican deserves credit for the dice machine.

The object in the diagram is obviously a telephone. A very old one, with a “non-metallic” or “earth return” connection. These were very susceptible to lightning, and Fritz is right, the toothy thing is what we would today call a “surge suppressor.”

Non-metallic circuits were no longer installed after WWI, but some continued in use until the 1940s. Metallic circuits (what we use today for land lines) still have surge suppressors. From the 1920s to the 1980s these were a black bakelite block with screw terminals mounted in the basement, and many of us still have them even if they are no longer connected. The had a both a spark gap and a carbon block. Suppressors today are located inside the demarc, the gray plastic box on the outside of your house.

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:50:19 +0000

Interesting guess Fritz; we shall see. :)

By: Fritz

Fritz — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:38:08 +0000

I think it’s a diagram for how to keep lightening from blowing up your phone, or at least not burning down your house when it does. The pair of close-spaced toothy things on the left is the gap the lightening is supposed to jump on the way to (E)arth.

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:08:47 +0000

TeacherPatti: I do remember those days; my dad still has such a phone, corded and all. My own landline is also a corded phone (no cell phone).

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 17:06:13 +0000

Dave: This is a man who instructs you on everything from “management of childbirth,” “gunsmithing,” “food for the sick,” “abdominal lifting,” “cements, various,” “gloves, to clean,” “horses, to teach tricks,” and “magnetic ointment” to……….how to make a popcorn ball.

And, it’s readable on Google Books! [link]

By: Laura Bien

Laura Bien — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 16:59:36 +0000

Joan, there are indeed some interesting recipes in his recipe book, aren’t there? I so enjoy reading his recipe book, though, because his personality is so evident and because I admire his chutzpah in blithely assuming that he was qualified to hand down advice on, well, everything. It is an endearing and very amusing book, and also sheds light on issues of his time; historically valuable in that way.

By: TeacherPatti

TeacherPatti — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 16:00:40 +0000

After I read “Something Wicked This Way Comes”, I became obsessed with our house having a lightning rod. I think my dad had to talk me down from the one :)

Is that a diagram for a telephone? (Remember when phones were a thing…in a room and they just made phone calls?)

By: Dave Askins

Dave Askins — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:44:36 +0000

Dr. Chase’s book seems at first glance like it might be pretty hilarious. From a recipe for popcorn balls: “… then with the hands press the corn into balls, as the boys do snow balls, being quick, lest it sets before you get through.”

By: Joan Lowenstein

Joan Lowenstein — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:07:10 +0000

I suppose swindling is in the eye of the beholder, Dr. Chase having recommended various liniments, "consumptive syrups," and "cholera tinctures" for the local populace. Found his book on the MSU library site: [link]. The object looks like some sort of doorbell.