October 1960 Popular Electronics
Table
of Contents
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles
from
Popular Electronics,
published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged.
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Now here is a profound ode to one of the most noble of technician
genres ever to tweak a receiver front end or to change out a transmitter
magnetron - The Radar Man! Some of you know that I worked on airport
surveillance and precision approach radar in the USAF, so my bias
is established. Hmmm... now that I read the poem more carefully,
I realize that it is not complimentary at all. It must have been
one of those jealous TACAN or satellite comms techs that wrote it!
BTW, have you seen the très cool scale model of the
MPN-13 GCA radar system that Elbert Cook built?
See all articles from
Popular Electronics.
The Radar Man
If
ever you saw upon the street
A man who walked with dipole feet
With a lagging train of pips behind-
He was a radar man with a micromind.
With microseconds and microwaves
And microvolts, he filled his days;
And thus in the course of passing time
His brain had shrunk to a micromind.
His eyes gave out with a neon gleam,
His nose lit up like a radar screen,
His ears worked like an electronic gate,
And his heart pumped blood at a video rate.
This man obtained, in passing years,
Infinite impedance between his ears.
At last he succumbed to a heavy jolt
When he probed what he thought was a microvolt.
The Doc looked up from his microscope
And said to the nurse, "Behold this dope!
Since of his brain not a trace can I find,
He was a radar man with a micromind."
- Educated G.I.
Posted May 14, 2014 |