After reading the morning headlines about the recent stock market downturn, a high-powered executive trying to impress a client in his office, flipped on his intercom switch and barked to his secretary, "Miss Hunter, get my broker!"
The client was impressed until he heard the secretary's clear voice saying, "Yes, Sir, stock or pawn?"
First privately-built satelliteIn 1961, the first satellite built by private citizens was put in to orbit. A Thor-Agena rocket, launched to deploy a militaryDiscoverer-36 satellite, also carried the 10-lb OSCAR I . The Orbiting Satellite Carrying Amateur Radio was deployed in low orbit, just above Earth's atmosphere, and it began transmitting "HI" in Morse code,10 times a minute. It was the 60th anniversary of Marconi's first transatlantic radio transmission, and little more than four years since Russia launched Sputnik on 4 Oct 1957. OSCAR 1 was designed and hand-built for $63 by California radio amateurs. The battery powered a 140-mW transmitter on 144.983 MHz, transmitting HI in Morse code for 22 days, for 312 orbits until 1 Jan 1962 when its non-rechargeable battery failed. It burned up in the atmosphere on 31 Jan 1962.« |
