No More Last Forty Winks

1914

Fiend Has Invented an Alarm Clock That Simply Insists on One's Rising in the Morning

It has often seemed, after the announcement of an invention to which the attention of the entire civilized world has been called, that the human mind could scarcely invent anything more and fashion it in material form, but the countless dreams of inventors continue to be realized in astounding numbers.

Every week, every month, the trade journals advertise and comment upon new things in the lines which they represent and publish new ideas which this material labor-saving age seizes and makes its own.

An alarm clock which awakens you with the words of a disgusted wife who has breakfast on the table, and a large vessel which carries submarines over long distances by means of a "pouch" are among the newest offerings.

As an ever present need, the alarm clock will probably be put into more general household use than the ship with the "pouch" for carrying submarines. In the evening before retiring you set the clock for 6:30; at 6:30 you will probably get up. Here is what will waken you:

"Six-thirty, six-thirty, six-thirty; time to get up; get up, can't you? Get up you miserable, lazy man. Get up, get up, get up!"

The first clock of this kind was exhibited in 1900, but it cost $2,500 to make it. The present offering costs $25. If you are awake in the middle of the night and wish to know the time, press a button and the clock will tell you the nearest quarter hour as: "Two-fifteen," if it happens to be 2:13 or 2:18. The phonographic record is on an endless belt and the grooves in which the voice vibrations are recorded run lengthwise of the belt. The belt continues to give out sound until shut off when once started. So far the clocks have been supplied with belts which talk in thirty-five languages.