Jack Northrop dreamt of aircraft where everything not absolutely essential for flight was eliminated. Leonardo da Vinci’s theoretical flying machines from the 15th century, Sir George Cayley’s Governable Parachute of 1852, the Wright Brothers’ Flyer of 1903 and virtually ever other flying machine all have one thing in common: they all have tails of one sort of another which are used to stabilize and control their flight. Northrop, contrarily, didn’t believe a tail was necessary. In fact, he believed anything other than the wing actively worked against the elusive goal of all aircraft designers: to find the most efficient means of getting an aircraft aloft and then keeping it there.

Listen to the rest by clicking the play button, above. The text version of this essay can be found on Medium where it was published contemporaneously. The key image for this episode is of the first flight of the all-jet powered YB-49 on October 21, 1947. (credit: AFFTC History Office)

It was a time when daring—or simply dangerous—aviation events were concocted for the slightest of excuses. In the case of the 1934 MacRobertson Air Race it was nominally to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the city of Melbourne, Australia. The sponsor for whom the race was named was provided this honour simply by putting up the £15,000 in prize money. Sir Macpherson Robertson—he preferred the more catchy ‘MacRobertson’—was an Australian confectionary baron who likely saw the unparalleled promotional opportunity for what it was: a means of getting his name, and subsequently his candy, on the lips of everybody from England to Australia and everywhere in between.

MacRobertson would accomplish this purely commercial objective simply by being the title sponsor for a race where entrants would depart Mildenhall, England and, as fast as they dared, make their way to Melbourne, Australia some 11,300 miles away...

Listen to the rest by clicking the play button, above. The text version of this essay can be found on Medium where it was published contemporaneously. The exquisite key image for this episode is by Kev Gregory and is available on Shutterstock. The image has been slightly cropped to fit the Fireside format.

Observations from the arrival of the Information Age.

I had a part time job at the ComputerLand store on West Broadway in Vancouver, British Columbia in the early 1980s. Mostly it was to teach an introductory programming course in the BASIC computer language on Saturday mornings. Ironically, it was one of the few things for which you bought a computer back then — to learn how to program them. The store manager didn’t see any point in sending me home after the morning class ended and had me stooge around on the sales floor instead. I was typically assigned the enthusiasts who would, without fail, walk in and want to bend the ear of a so-called expert. Lacking any real experts, I was provided in their stead...

Listen to the rest by clicking the play button, above. The text version of this essay can be found on TerenceCGannon.com where it was published contemporaneously. (image: IBM Canada’s King Street Datacentre circa 1964. Photograph by George Dunbar, courtesy of International Business Machines Corporation, ©International Business Machines Corporation.)

The airship hangars at Tillamook trigger a cascade of memories.

My family first visited the Oregon Coast in the early 1970s. My mother picked Rockaway, seemingly at random, from the motor club guide and we stayed at the Silver Sands, an old-fashioned drive-up motel on the beach. All five of us squeezed into a single suite, the most memorable thing about which was the mysterious Magic Fingers Relaxation Service. This was a box on the night table which if you put in a quarter made the bed vibrate in a way that made absolutely no sense to a 12 year old. “How on earth would you ever get to sleep?” I thought, obviously not yet fully able to understand that sleeping may not have been the point. Back then, it just seemed odd...

Listen to the rest by clicking the play button, above. The text version of this essay can be found on Medium where it was published contemporaneously. (image: "Naval Air Station Tillamook during World War II" credit: Tillamook Air Museum)

An unsolicited prediction of what The Big A will do next. Well, even if they don’t, then they really should.

Despite what you might think, not one second of Apple’s podcasts are actually hosted by Apple. “But how can that be”, you may ask, “when they ‘host’ hundreds of thousands of them?” It’s simple. When you download a podcast ‘from Apple’ what you are really doing is using them as an index — a pointer, if you will — to a file located somewhere else. That’s why you might find some podcasts really sparkle on iTunes, downloading quickly and streaming promptly, while others really stink. I know because I’ve done it both ways. Incidentally, not stinking is a great way in increase download counts, as I eventually discovered.

But I‘m ahead of myself...

Listen to the rest by clicking the play button, above. A version of this essay previously appeared on Medium on April 24th, 2017. On June 10, 2017, Apple announced Podcast Analytics which will be launched later this year. This is very close to at least one aspect of what was predicted in this essay. (header photo: Shunichi Kouroki via Wikimedia Commons under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic)

Musings on Residential Solar

As I consider residential solar...I’m wondering—maybe for the first time in my life—if my early adopter shields should be up and whether I should let others pave the solar highway. There is a significant difference in this case: in my earlier, early adopter escapades I could at least be shown up as a rube in the privacy of my own home. There was only my wife providing judgemental looks of disapproval. Or pity, I’m not sure which exactly.

With the consideration of residential solar, however, there is the potential of subjecting myself to a much harsher brand of judgement: that is—yes—that annual select committee enquiry that is the neighbourhood summer barbecue. Because solar panels are so prominent, I am pretty much guaranteed a non-stop string of engagements with the opening number always being the same: “So how is that solar thing working out for you...”

Listen, above, or read the essay instead.

The prospects for the 1939 Coupe Deutsch de la Meurthe air race did not look good. Suzanne Deutsch de la Meurthe, the widow of the “Oil King of France” Henri, had revived the competition in 1931 in memory of her late husband...

Listen, above, or read the essay instead.