NOVA explores the fascinating world of Dr. Harold Edgerton, electronics wizard and inventor extraordinaire, whose invention of the electronic strobe, a "magic lamp," has enabled the human eye to see the unseen.
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00:00One man made the machines that can show us the fluid beauty in a drop of milk and capture
00:20a speeding bullet in mid-flight. He helped us win a war by lighting up the French countryside
00:29and froze the first instant of an atomic blast. He uses sound to make pictures that
00:39help find sunken ships. His machines rearrange bits of time and motion and expand the limits
00:50of our vision. His name is Harold Edgerton, but everyone calls him Doc. Major funding
01:02for NOVA is provided by this station and other public television stations nationwide. Additional
01:08funding was provided by the Johnson & Johnson family of companies, supplying health care
01:13products worldwide. And Allied Corporation, a world leader in advanced technology products
01:22for the aerospace, automotive, chemicals, and electronics industries.
01:47The Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1927, while Harold Edgerton was a graduate
01:52student of engineering here, he designed a magic lamp, the stroboscope. Edgerton's strobe
01:58became an indispensable tool of science, industry, and art. It could flash a million times a
02:04second and it revolutionized the way we see.
02:07If you're working with anything, anything, and you want to understand it, you've got
02:11to see it and record it and learn all about it.
02:34Lightning. Electrical energy transformed into bursts of brilliant light. If you bottle this
02:40light and make it reliable and precise, you have the secret of Edgerton's strobe.
02:53Today the strobe is familiar as the flash on the family snapshot camera and as the timing
03:00light in workshops and garages. At airports around the world, strobe lights guide planes
03:07safely home. And strobes make possible pictures of things no human eye can see.
03:24Your eyes aren't designed for speed. You shoot a bullet through here, you won't even see
03:29it. You won't know anything about it at all. So you have to have strobe.
03:35In his lab at MIT, Doc Edgerton takes a high-speed photograph of a bullet in flight. The only
03:42light at the instant of exposure will be from one of his magic lamps, an electronic strobe,
03:48and will last only one one-millionth of a second.
03:55Lights out.
03:57You have to have a strobe to see it.
04:00So why not call it a magic lamp? What's magic lamp mean to you? It's something, does something
04:08you never saw before. Dazzles you. Well, that's what it does. From a photographing standpoint,
04:16if you never used an electronic flash lamp and you suddenly had one, you'd say, hey,
04:21this is terrific. Look at all the things it can do.
04:25Is this before the drop hit, or is it after the drop hit?
04:28After one drop.
04:31People like it because it puts the action into a form that's frozen so that you can
04:36recognize what's happening.
04:38There's also an aesthetic quality of beauty in motion.
04:42It's supposed to be real art. Well, I don't care. That's all right. If they want to call
04:48it art, well, they can call it art.
04:52Well, I really think of myself as a more electrical engineer. I want to get the message across.
05:00It's an educational experience.
05:02This one, the strobe went off at the time you let go of the arrow.
05:06Well, I used to be a photographer. It really started a long time ago. The first photographer
05:10who was ever done was a fellow in England named Fox Talbot.
05:15Fox Talbot demonstrated that unblurred photographs could be made of fast-moving objects.
05:21In 1851, he used the electric spark from a primitive battery to effectively freeze the
05:26image of the London Times as it spun around on a revolving wheel.
05:32This was the first stop-action photograph, and Fox Talbot's technique was called spark photography.
05:42By the end of the century, spark photography was used occasionally in scientific experiments.
05:47High-speed close-up pictures of splashes were made by physics professor A.M. Worthington
05:52using sparks of very brief duration, only 1,100,000th of a second.
05:57The pictures were remarkable, but they lacked detail.
06:01Spark photography remained a laboratory curiosity until Harold Edgerton developed the strobe
06:0630 years later.
06:08Only then could pictures like this one be made, a milk drop in perfect detail at 1,100,000th of a second.
06:19But it wasn't to examine a splash of milk that Doc designed the strobe.
06:23It was to solve an engineering problem, part of his doctoral thesis.
06:28He needed to measure the moving parts of a high-speed synchronous motor.
06:32First, he made a mathematical model.
06:35And I solved these problems theoretically.
06:38So then the next problem was, does the real motor in the real world do the same thing?
06:43And it's a difficult measurement to make.
06:48It has to be done to measure the rotor, the angle.
06:51When you can't do it electrically, you have to do it optically.
06:54So that's how I happened to say, well, the strobe will do it.
06:59Then the strobe has to have enough power and energy so you can take movies,
07:03so we can plot these things because they happen real quick, you know.
07:06The duration of the flash is about a little less than 10 microseconds.
07:10That's 100,000th of a second.
07:12That was a remarkable thing.
07:14Everybody looked at this motor. It was going at a high speed.
07:17It was just as sharp and clear as it was standing still.
07:20The principle of Edgerton's innovation had long been understood,
07:24that light flashing at exactly the same rate as a rotating object would freeze the object's motion.
07:30Edgerton's strobe was revolutionary because it flashed so rapidly
07:34that even extremely fast-moving objects could be stopped.
07:37And it was so bright that clear, detailed pictures could be made.
07:44And once you had it in a way, everything was easy.
07:49I'd worked for three years on motors and I suddenly realized,
07:52hey, there's a lot of things in the world that move.
07:55I looked around and there was a faucet over there. It was right next to where I was working.
07:58So I just moved the strobe over and took a picture of this water coming out of the faucet.
08:03That was the first picture I ever took, except for a motor.
08:22One of the most important things about all high-speed photography
08:25is getting it at the right instant.
08:28And there are all kinds of ways to do this.
08:30And the simplest one, from a bullet standpoint, is to use a simple microphone.
08:35So when a shockwave hits the microphone, it turns on the light.
08:39And if you don't like it, move the microphone just a little bit
08:43and you can get the whole sequence.
08:46Doc checks out the microphone that triggers the strobe.
08:50The timing must be perfect.
08:52Although he's made this shot 10,000 times, he takes careful aim.
09:07If you just show the bullet, people look at it and say,
09:10how did you hang that up there? Where's the string? I don't see the string.
09:14But if you put the apple in there, you can tell that apple was hit by that bullet
09:18and that bullet is moving fast.
09:22Doc's fascination with things in motion
09:25led him to make another new kind of photograph with his strobe.
09:28He called it multi-flash.
09:30By flashing a strobe on his subject while the camera shutter remains open,
09:34he makes a sequence of exposures on a single piece of film.
09:38One exposure for each flash.
09:43Hello, Sandy.
09:44Here's how he does it.
09:45I want you to say hello to Ellen Dixon.
09:47Hi.
09:48Sandy, she's going to do some acrobatics for the multi-flash.
09:52Be sure to watch. You're going to run the camera for me.
09:54I'm going to run the light. We're going to make a team.
09:56Try to catch her in the air.
09:59Come over here.
10:00Be careful.
10:01We're getting you up in the air a little bit so you get a picture from a low camera.
10:05And be sure to hit that corner over there.
10:07Come down.
10:08And this light, I want to see you do it first,
10:10just like you're going to do it so Ellen can judge it.
10:12All right, ready?
10:13One, two, three, go.
10:19Perfect.
10:20Now, this time I'm going to flash the light on you.
10:22And don't get excited when it flashes and you're upside down there.
10:25Ignore the light.
10:26Ready?
10:27All right, go.
10:31Fine.
10:32Now we're going to make it more difficult.
10:34We're going to turn out all the lights.
10:36And open the shutter when I say open,
10:39and then we'll take a series of pictures of her on the film.
10:42Get ready.
10:44One, two, three, four, five, six.
10:47Perfect.
11:10So that's all there is to multi-flash photography,
11:12getting the right light on the right subject on the right film
11:16right flashes all together, and you get a nice picture.
11:22In his stroboscopic light laboratory at MIT,
11:25Doc has been teaching and figuring things out for over 50 years.
11:29He is one of only a dozen distinguished institute professors,
11:33and he's something of an institution here himself.
11:37He's been officially retired since 1968,
11:40but nearly every day Doc plays around with his contraptions in the lab.
11:45He delights in demonstrating the properties of various materials.
11:49Here, neon gas.
11:51No, neon.
11:53This is a glow from high frequency coming out of this spark coil.
11:57It goes right through the glass and excites the neon atoms.
12:02They give a red color when they recombine.
12:08Gases are a critical component of every strobe.
12:11It is the gas inside each lamp that, when charged with electric current,
12:15produces the flash.
12:17In the early days of electronic strobe,
12:19every lamp was specially designed and custom-made of hand-blown glass.
12:23Doc made many of them himself.
12:25This is a setup for making electronic flash tubes.
12:29One of the flash tubes is here.
12:30This is the anode and the cathode,
12:32and it's connected to a vacuum system.
12:35First I have to suck the air out of it.
12:37You'll hear the pump.
12:42I hope you can.
12:43The pump is pulling air out.
12:46I'll let it pump for a while,
12:48be sure this air gets out of here.
12:51Okay.
12:53Close enough to zero.
12:54I'll turn this pump off.
12:58Then I'll turn on the argon gas.
13:00It comes out of this big tank over here.
13:02That's about two centimeters of argon.
13:06Turn the valve off,
13:08and I'll test it.
13:09You can see the argon gas in there.
13:12I'll put the voltage on.
13:15This is the switch that turns on the high voltage.
13:18That's 2,000 volts right there.
13:20This is the button that makes it go.
13:22Hey, look at that.
13:25So that's the way we make flash lamps.
13:28All the high school kids use flash.
13:30Everybody uses flash.
13:33It comes free.
13:34It's like the sun.
13:36It's right there.
13:37Shoot.
13:39During a trip to his hometown of Aurora, Nebraska,
13:42Doc runs into a local photographer
13:44who is a fan of him and his work.
13:47What's that blinking light you got on that thing?
13:49That's a strobe light invented by a guy
13:51by the name of Edgerton, I think,
13:53way back in the 1800s, wasn't it?
13:56No, I don't remember when he did that,
13:58but it was a fantastic invention.
14:00That was just last week that invention came.
14:02Is that right?
14:03Yeah, those strobe lights are modern.
14:05We didn't have them in the old days.
14:07They were all made in Boston, in Cambridge.
14:10I designed them, and we built them,
14:12and had the lamps made,
14:14and we were trying to get Eastman to sell them.
14:16Yeah.
14:17That worked out pretty well.
14:18I don't remember if it was 40 or 41,
14:20but I know my dad bought one of the very first sets
14:22just before the war.
14:26Harold Eugene Edgerton
14:28was born in nearby Fremont, Nebraska,
14:30in 1903.
14:34His family moved to Washington, D.C.,
14:36but they preferred small-town life.
14:39So in 1916, Doc came back to Aurora.
14:43Then, as now, the courthouse was a landmark of the town.
14:48There were four 200-watt lamps up there,
14:53and they used to burn out,
14:55and I had a job in the electric light plant,
14:57so I would have to come down
14:59and climb up the stairs
15:01and reach out way out over the...
15:04unscrew that bulb.
15:07I can still remember.
15:08It's a long way down.
15:12After I graduated from high school here,
15:14I went down to the University of Nebraska
15:16because I was interested in electricity.
15:19I intended to go back
15:20and work for the electric light people here,
15:22and my father said I ought to go east
15:24and go to MIT.
15:26Well, I never heard of the place,
15:29but I asked a student from Aurora
15:31who had gone to Harvard
15:33whether he'd heard of it,
15:34and he said, oh, yeah.
15:35He looked me in the eye and said,
15:37they only take smart people.
15:39I didn't take the hint.
15:41And it was a good thing, too,
15:43because it was during his graduate studies
15:45in electrical engineering here
15:47that Doc designed and developed the strobe.
15:52The first commercial prototype was ready by 1931.
15:56Edgerton joined forces with two former students,
15:59Herbert Greer and Kenneth Germeshausen,
16:01and it wasn't long before there was
16:03a whole battery of magic lights
16:05for many specialized uses.
16:12The still pictures they made were dazzling,
16:15but Doc wanted to use strobes
16:17to make high-speed movies.
16:19He designed a new type of camera
16:21that could whip film through
16:22a thousand frames per second
16:24in synchronization with a pulsing strobe.
16:27As always, he drew upon everyday life
16:29for his subject matter.
16:54piano plays softly
17:25People had never seen movies like these before.
17:29News spread far and wide about Doc's invention.
17:32Before long, a man from Hollywood came calling.
17:38He said, I work for MGM,
17:40and I'd like to invite you
17:42to come to Hollywood.
17:44I said, well, what's the matter?
17:46He said, well, I've got a job.
17:48I said, well, what's the matter?
17:50He said, well, I've got a job.
17:52I said, well, I'd like to invite you
17:54to come to Hollywood and show this camera
17:56to all of our people,
17:58and we'll take some pictures with it,
18:00and maybe we'll make a short with Pete Smith,
18:03who was their comedian.
18:06The film was called Quicker Than a Wink,
18:09and it won a 1936 Academy Award for MGM.
18:13First, Charlie Lacy will hit the ball
18:15through this telephone book.
18:17Maybe.
18:19Here it comes.
18:21Wow, look at that.
18:23Charlie has ruined a lot of good names,
18:26and good phone numbers, too.
18:28Woo-woo!
18:29I always thought that my cat,
18:31in lapping her milk, curled her tongue up,
18:34but now it's revealed that she curls her tongue down.
18:37See?
18:39In other words, she brings the milk up
18:42on the underside of her tongue.
18:44Now see how smart you get when you go to the movie?
18:48Most of you have heard,
18:50and perhaps have even felt,
18:52that cute little drill.
18:58Wow, there it goes.
19:03And so it is with this happy thought
19:05that we reluctantly bid farewell to Stroboscope
19:08and sail into the setting sun.
19:12Doc and his colleagues added the finishing touch,
19:15adding slow-motion sound to high-speed pictures.
20:15These days, Doc uses a modern version
20:18of his early high-speed camera
20:20to film a slow-motion sequence of milk drops.
20:25Now, ready to fill up the dripper.
20:30Now, let's fill up the dripper.
20:33Now, let's fill up the dripper.
20:36Now, let's fill up the dripper.
20:39Now, let's fill up the dripper.
20:42Now, let's fill up the dripper.
20:45Well, we're going to try to
20:48make this milk drop splash into a
20:51crown shape on a plate.
20:53So I'll put this plate on here,
20:55and then I'll let the drop come down,
20:58the first drop.
21:00We'll give you some milk to work on.
21:03And then the second one will hit the first drop
21:06and make the crown.
21:14And then the second one will hit the first drop.
21:44And then the second one will hit the first drop.
22:15This looks like a series of
22:17individual colored drops
22:19filmed in slow motion.
22:21But it's actually a stream of water
22:23being pushed out by a pump
22:25in separate pulses,
22:26splashing onto a metallic plate
22:28at normal speed.
22:30The individual drops are revealed by a strobe
22:33flashing at the same rate
22:34as the pulsing of the pump.
22:36Doc calls it his fiddler machine,
22:38and he loves to show it to people.
22:42What it is is a pump pumping some water
22:45with a little dye in it,
22:47and it looks like a continuous stream.
22:50But if you shine a light on it
22:52that's flashing 60 times a second,
22:54it shows that it's actually a series of drops
22:57because the pump is working intermittently.
23:00And you can make it appear to go either down
23:04or up by changing the frequency of the light.
23:12In the exhibit in the hall,
23:13there's two push buttons.
23:16The visitors can push one,
23:17it gives them ordinary light.
23:19They push the other button,
23:20it gives them strobe light.
23:22Or they can push the two buttons together.
23:32Doc has a portable fiddler,
23:34which he takes with him all over the world
23:36to demonstrate the strobe.
23:38Today, he takes it into a restaurant
23:40in his Nebraska hometown.
23:43Come on over a little closer.
23:44You've got to be close.
23:46You can't be standoffish in this business.
23:48You ready?
23:49Yes.
23:50You ready?
23:51Yes.
23:52Okay.
23:53Now watch it real close.
23:55Isn't that pretty?
23:56When you show the light on it,
23:58that's what causes it.
23:59But your eyes can't tell it.
24:01Your eyes are no good for anything that moves fast.
24:04I like to see people recognize
24:06they've seen something they never saw before
24:08and that they've learned something.
24:10Their eyes open up
24:11and they're so awed by what they see.
24:14That's a good educational shock.
24:17Now watch it.
24:18Hey, don't go away.
24:20You ready?
24:21Okay.
24:22Whistle.
24:23Laughter.
24:26Whistle.
24:28Turning it off makes a difference.
24:29The whistle has nothing to do with it.
24:31Laughter.
24:34Now you fellas,
24:35since you've been so cooperative,
24:36you get a prize.
24:38Yeah.
24:39One for you.
24:40Thank you.
24:41One for you.
24:42Thank you.
24:45That's the way we make apple sauce back here at MIT.
24:49But we don't recommend it.
24:52While you're taking a picture of a bullet,
24:54you go in a dark room,
24:55you put the camera on bulb,
24:57you open the camera up,
24:59the bullet comes through,
25:01sound hits the microphone,
25:02turns the light on for a minute or a second,
25:05makes your exposure,
25:07then you close the shutter
25:08and put a change of film.
25:12Ever since I've been here,
25:13I've been giving lecture demonstrations.
25:15I drag in all kinds of equipment,
25:17run it,
25:18and let the students see it.
25:20My argument is that
25:21that's the way to get to the real world,
25:23is to go out and work with it.
25:27And now I want to demonstrate
25:29this big strobe over here.
25:30Would you like to see a big one?
25:31Okay, here's a big one.
25:33And this is a strobe light.
25:39This is not a portable job.
25:42You don't attach this to the camera.
25:45But this was made in the war
25:47when we were having trouble with the Germans
25:49and we used to want to know
25:50what they were doing at nighttime.
25:52Well, you fly over France and Germany
25:54and see what they're doing.
25:56During World War II,
25:58keeping track of enemy troops was essential,
26:00but difficult even in the daytime.
26:02At night, the only way
26:03was to take photographs
26:04from an airplane flying at 10,000 feet
26:07using leftover flash powder bombs
26:09from World War I.
26:10But it required clear skies
26:12and the flash bombs
26:13could blow up right in the plane.
26:15The military was looking for something better.
26:17So in 1938,
26:18they called on Harold Edgerton.
26:20Well, one Saturday afternoon,
26:22we were down in the lab here working
26:24and a fellow came in and said,
26:26where's that blinking light
26:27that you care about?
26:29And I said, it's right there.
26:31The fellow was Colonel George W. Goddard
26:33of the Air Force Photographic Lab.
26:35He wanted Edgerton
26:36to create a new type of strobe
26:38for aerial reconnaissance,
26:40one powerful enough
26:41to allow pictures to be taken
26:42from an airplane
26:43flying at only a few thousand feet.
26:46Doc and his associates
26:47went to work on the top-secret project.
26:50The end result was a strobe package
26:52that produced more than
26:5357,000 watt-seconds of light,
26:55powered by eight kilowatts
26:57weighing 3,700 pounds.
26:59Its power was impressive,
27:01as Edgerton enjoys demonstrating.
27:03You ready to go, Bill?
27:06All right, get ready.
27:07One, two, three, push.
27:12Went up my yardstick.
27:14The new strobes worked wonders,
27:17so Doc went to war
27:18to assemble a squadron
27:19of night photo pilots.
27:21But the pilots resisted.
27:23They wanted to fight the war,
27:24not take pictures of it.
27:27So we had a morale problem.
27:30Couldn't get anybody to fly.
27:32That's when I worked up
27:33that nudist camp story.
27:35I heard about this nudist camp
27:37out near England,
27:38there somewhere near London.
27:40And I found the coordinates,
27:42so I knew exactly where it was,
27:44and I said,
27:45I want volunteers.
27:46I want to take some pictures.
27:48And immediately they perked right up.
27:51And they flew so low
27:55that people on the ground
27:57were spelling out things
27:58with the towels, you see,
28:00reporting you.
28:01It was a lot of fun.
28:02And they finally got interested in it,
28:04because it's a real challenge.
28:07The Americans had been won over,
28:09but our European allies
28:10weren't convinced
28:11that strobes could do the job.
28:14We had a big meeting
28:15up in London somewhere.
28:16Everybody sat around the table
28:17and drank coffee,
28:18and finally said,
28:19hey, there's too much talk.
28:21You're not of action.
28:22Why don't we go out
28:23and take some target?
28:25And you try your no-good system,
28:27and we'll try ours,
28:28and we'll see if it's as bad.
28:31And that appealed to them.
28:32So they said,
28:33well, we don't know what target to try.
28:36I said, I can suggest one
28:38that nobody will complain about
28:41in the slightest.
28:42And they said, what's that?
28:44And it's Stonehenge.
28:45I said, it's out in the country.
28:46There's no lights around it.
28:47Nobody lives out there.
28:49It's a nice big thing,
28:50and it's easy to photograph.
28:51Take night photos of Stonehenge.
28:54And they did.
28:55This startling aerial view
28:56was made with a strobe.
28:58The Edgerton Airborne Photographic System
29:00was a success,
29:01and it went to work
29:02for the Allied cause.
29:04Its value was demonstrated dramatically
29:06the night before the invasion of Normandy,
29:08June 6, 1944.
29:16The pictures made with strobes
29:17showed little or no movement
29:19of enemy troops,
29:20indicating that the Germans
29:21were unprepared for the invasion.
29:23The clouds were down about 1,000 feet,
29:27and the flash bombs
29:28couldn't be used at all
29:29because they were designed
29:30to be working at 10,000 feet.
29:32So those pictures were useful.
29:34They were used all during the war.
29:41The atomic bomb
29:42brought the end of World War II,
29:45and it ushered in
29:46an era of nuclear research.
29:48The government called
29:49on Edgerton again,
29:51this time for his expertise
29:52in specialized high-speed photography.
29:56The Atomic Energy Commission
29:57was making above-ground tests
29:59of atomic devices
30:00on Pacific islands
30:01like Eniwetok Atoll.
30:05Edgerton and his MIT associates,
30:07Germeshausen and Greer,
30:08formed a company,
30:09which later became EG&G Inc.,
30:12and designed a testing camera
30:13to analyze nuclear explosions.
30:17High-speed cameras,
30:18capable of taking
30:19several million separate pictures
30:21per second,
30:22are placed close to zero point.
30:24They will record the story
30:25of nuclear forces
30:27from a vantage point
30:28where man himself dares not stand.
30:31Ten, seven, nine, eight,
30:35seven, six, five, four,
30:39three, two, one,
30:43and zero.
30:49Nearly every picture
30:50the public has ever seen
30:51of a nuclear explosion
30:53was made with the equipment
30:54designed by EG&G.
30:57These devices also filmed
30:59the effects of atomic blasts
31:00on buildings.
31:04Edgerton's high-speed cameras
31:06made it possible to watch
31:07what actually happened.
31:12If you blow up an atom bomb,
31:14it happens instantly.
31:18Most shutters are way too slow,
31:19so we built some
31:20magneto-optic shutters
31:21that work in a minute to a second.
31:26I had a long-focus telescope,
31:30and you want to know
31:31what's going on in the early stages.
31:36And we're scientists
31:37working on the facts.
31:38Our role is to find out
31:39everything we can
31:40about the thing.
31:44And that was where it started,
31:45EG&G Incorporated.
31:47It started right after the war
31:49as an in-house captive thing
31:52for the nuclear energy.
31:55And we hired a lot of people,
31:57and we set off a lot of atom bombs
31:59and did a lot of experimental things.
32:02And then suddenly one day
32:03we had an agreement
32:05with the Russians
32:06not to have any more atom bombs.
32:08All my friends came around here
32:10and said,
32:11oh, it's too bad your company's
32:12going down a drain
32:13because the Russians and Americans
32:15are going to not do it anymore.
32:17And I said, oh, yeah.
32:18I learned a lot long ago
32:19not to get excited
32:20when people panic.
32:22Well, that was the best year
32:23we ever had
32:24because all the people
32:25got up early in the morning
32:26and started thinking
32:27about other things to do
32:30and was all kinds of things to do.
32:34EG&G began to grow,
32:36and it now has 160 different operations
32:38all over the world.
32:40It manufactures electronics
32:42for space stations and submarines,
32:45geologists, and doctors.
32:47They employ 21,000 people
32:49and have sales
32:50of over $1 billion a year.
32:53But success didn't overwhelm
32:54Doc's principal fascination,
32:56looking at the natural world.
32:58One of his favorites
32:59was Spooky the Owl
33:00at Boston's Museum of Science.
33:02Let him go.
33:05Terrific.
33:06Well, birds are awfully hard to catch.
33:08To get them timed
33:09and get them in front of the camera
33:10and get them photographed,
33:13you have to have strobe
33:14to get real sharp, distinctive pictures
33:16of the wing tips
33:17that are going high velocity.
33:21But spectacular as these photographs were,
33:24Doc had a hard time
33:25getting them published
33:27until one evening.
33:29I went to Rochester, New York
33:30to a cocktail party,
33:32and there was a bunch of people
33:33up there in this old Eastman house,
33:35and over in the corner
33:36was an old gray-haired man
33:38standing all by himself
33:39drinking a ginger ale.
33:41So I just went over
33:42and had a ginger ale
33:43and went over and talked to him,
33:44and I said,
33:45My name's Harold Edgerton,
33:46and he said,
33:47Mine is Gilbert Grosvenor.
33:48And I said,
33:49Gilbert Grosvenor?
33:50I said,
33:51Aren't you the fellow
33:52that runs that Yellowback magazine
33:53down here in Washington?
33:55Yeah, yeah.
33:56He said,
33:57Well, I said,
33:58I'm glad to meet you
33:59for about two years now.
34:00And I get back
34:01these bed bug letters
34:02saying,
34:03No, we don't...
34:04And he said,
34:05What was it about?
34:06And I said,
34:07It's about bird photography.
34:08There's a new method of photography
34:09that's going to photograph birds
34:10with the wings sharp and clear.
34:12He says,
34:13Is that right?
34:14We said,
34:15From now on,
34:16send all the letters
34:17marked to me personal.
34:19And from then on,
34:20I had a friend in the house,
34:21and Geographic
34:22has been full of bird pictures.
34:24DOC'S CURIOSITY
34:42Doc's curiosity
34:43took him next
34:44into oceans and rivers.
34:46He developed a strobe system
34:47that worked underwater,
34:49and he combined it
34:50with a camera
34:51that made time-lapse exposures,
34:53one frame every 10 seconds,
34:55to speed up motion
34:56instead of slowing it down.
34:58I built three units.
34:59We were going to go out
35:00and steady the sediments
35:02in the harbor,
35:03because every day
35:04the tides are going in,
35:05the tides are coming out,
35:06and they're taking the mud
35:07and moving it around.
35:08And I was going to
35:09put those down there
35:10and learn how that mud moves.
35:13Well, it just shows
35:14that a landlubber
35:15can't visualize
35:17what's going on in the sea
35:18because the bottom doesn't move.
35:20The mud goes through,
35:22and the gravel stays,
35:24and it's covered
35:25by all kinds of wildlife
35:26down there.
35:28And lo and behold,
35:29these movies were okay.
35:31They showed starfish
35:32and all kinds of things
35:34walking around on the bottom.
35:37The human being
35:38is no good for looking at starfish.
35:40If you look at starfish
35:41sitting on the bottom,
35:42he just sits there.
35:44That's because
35:45your time-reference frame
35:47is no good.
35:48He's actually moving
35:49very slowly,
35:51and when you speed him up
35:52200 times,
35:54he's going around
35:55doing all kinds of things.
35:58One thing just led to another
35:59because I got a telephone call
36:01that said there was
36:02some unknown man
36:03come in from France,
36:05a young Frenchman
36:06with a big nose
36:08named Jacques Cousteau.
36:10Nobody ever heard of him,
36:11but he's here,
36:12and could he come up
36:13and talk to you
36:14about underwater diving?
36:15Well, I said, sure,
36:16I'll talk to anybody.
36:18So he came in,
36:19and I found out
36:20that he was the head
36:21of the Aqualung,
36:22and he hadn't been in MIT
36:23more than a couple hours
36:24before we had a tank
36:25on his back,
36:26and he was testing
36:27my latest underwater strobe
36:29in the swimming pool.
36:31And that led to a,
36:32I don't know,
36:33many, many expeditions
36:34on the Calypso
36:35and a lot of articles
36:36in the Geographic.
36:37I think he was here
36:38for 24 hours,
36:39and we worked out
36:40enough programs
36:41and classes
36:42for, oh, another 100 years.
36:44We haven't finished him yet.
36:48When you go out in the ocean
36:49and you look around,
36:50you see nothing but water.
36:51You know that down
36:52at the bottom
36:53there's all kinds
36:54of interesting things
36:55happening down there.
36:56We took pictures
36:57of the bottom of the sea.
36:58Up at that time,
36:59there were actually
37:00pictures made
37:01of the bottom of the sea
37:02showing what's down there.
37:04But the strobe's beam
37:05could only illuminate
37:06a narrow underwater path,
37:08and if the water was murky,
37:09the strobe was no good at all.
37:12Doc needed a new tool
37:13to help make good pictures
37:14underwater.
37:16Enter sonar.
37:18Sonar devices
37:19have long been used
37:20aboard ships
37:21to monitor the water depth below.
37:23They send out sound waves
37:24which hit the bottom
37:25and reflect back.
37:27The time between the signal
37:28and its echo
37:29indicates the depth
37:30of the water.
37:31Doc was working
37:32with Cousteau
37:33in the Mediterranean
37:34when, with characteristic
37:35resourcefulness,
37:36he thought of a new way
37:37to use the old device.
37:41The first sonar,
37:43as I recall it,
37:45there may be a little truth
37:46in this,
37:47was we pulled into
37:48Toulon Harbor
37:49one night,
37:50late in the evening,
37:51and we'd been trying
37:53to get photos
37:54of the bottom.
37:55And in mid-water
37:56there's no problem
37:57because the camera
37:58just takes pictures,
37:59bang, bang, bang.
38:00But when you get close
38:01to the bottom,
38:02if you get too low,
38:03the camera goes
38:04into the bottom
38:05and that doesn't work.
38:06If it's too high,
38:07it doesn't work.
38:08So the problem was
38:09to get a sonar ticker
38:11and put it right
38:12on the camera
38:13and listen to it
38:14from the surface
38:15and get the echo
38:16from the bottom
38:17and get the direct signal
38:18from the pinger.
38:20And by measuring
38:21the time between
38:22these two,
38:23tick, tick,
38:24and only velocity sound,
38:25we can say,
38:26aha,
38:27that camera's 20 feet high,
38:28lower 10 feet.
38:29It's almost like magic
38:30to be on a ship
38:31and watch this little scope
38:32and say to the sailor,
38:33hey, drop that camera
38:3410 feet,
38:35raise it 10 feet.
38:37Yeah,
38:38that worked wonders.
38:40Doc thought sonar
38:41might be able to see
38:42a completely unexplored
38:43part of the
38:44underwater world,
38:45below the bottom,
38:46into the mud,
38:47where all sorts
38:48of things are buried.
38:50Back at MIT,
38:51he developed the mud pinger,
38:52a penetrating sonar device.
38:55The pinger reveals
38:56the contours of whatever
38:57is buried below,
38:58geological formations,
39:00archaeological treasures,
39:01sunken ships,
39:03or the pair of tunnels
39:04beneath Boston Harbor.
39:06Okay, this is a,
39:07a,
39:08what we call
39:09a penetrating sonar.
39:10It's a,
39:11a rather low frequency.
39:13It's down around
39:14three to five,
39:15six kilocycles.
39:16These are transmitters
39:17that the Navy uses
39:19for looking for submarines,
39:21made by a NASA company
39:22down in Hingham.
39:24And they,
39:25when I put an electrical
39:26signal onto this,
39:27it gives a ping.
39:28The sound will go up
39:29and hit the ceiling,
39:30come back and hit
39:31the receiver.
39:32And I measure the time
39:33that it takes
39:34for the signal to go up
39:35and go back.
39:36And when we use it,
39:37we turn it over
39:38and put it in the water.
39:40And the first signal
39:41that comes back
39:42is from the bottom.
39:43And then,
39:44some of this energy
39:45goes into the bottom,
39:46like when you're looking
39:47for the tunnels,
39:48and hit the top of the tunnel,
39:49which is down about 15 feet,
39:51and gives me an echo
39:52from it.
39:53So with this machine,
39:54I can find those tunnels.
39:56I'd like to have you
39:57listen to it run.
39:59Now I'll turn on the pinger.
40:02Now if I move it over
40:03a little bit,
40:04I can see that
40:05fluorescent lamp,
40:06I hope.
40:07How about giving it
40:08a push, Bill?
40:10And line it right up
40:11with the fluorescent lamp.
40:14And you'll notice
40:15that the distance
40:16from the fluorescent lamp
40:17to the transmitter
40:18is considerably less
40:19than from the ceiling
40:22to the transmitter.
40:26At first,
40:27the paper printout
40:28looks like a series
40:29of undistinguished lines.
40:30But it is actually
40:31a vertical cross-section
40:32of the room.
40:35This thick, dark line
40:36is the transmitter.
40:38The top line
40:39is the ceiling.
40:40And the intermediate band
40:41is the fluorescent
40:42light fixture.
40:44This shadowy line
40:45is the ceiling
40:46above the light fixture.
40:50This image was made
40:51near the mouth
40:52of Boston Harbor.
40:53Below the bottom
40:54is the geological thumbprint
40:56of the Ice Age,
40:57a terminal moraine,
40:59a solid granite core
41:00marking the edge
41:01of the glacier
41:02as it moved into the sea
41:0320,000 years ago.
41:07This image,
41:08made in Boston's
41:09Sumner Harbor,
41:10shows a more uniform
41:11bottom.
41:12But buried 15 feet
41:13below it
41:14are two large objects,
41:15the Sumner Tunnel
41:16and its twin,
41:17the Callahan,
41:18carrying millions
41:19of cars a year
41:20under the harbor
41:21between the city
41:22of Boston
41:23and Logan Airport.
41:24Because they're
41:25a permanent part
41:26of Boston Harbor's
41:27underwater profile,
41:28Doc uses them
41:29to test new sonar devices.
41:31He goes out
41:32every chance he gets.
41:35And our pet target
41:36is the tunnels
41:37that go over
41:38the two tunnels.
41:40And when we go out
41:41with this machine
41:42and we can't find them,
41:43we know there's something
41:44wrong with the equipment
41:45or us
41:46because those tunnels
41:47stay there.
41:49Doc and his two assistants
41:50test out a new
41:51modification on the pinger.
41:56They hold cores
41:57across the harbor
41:58as the submerged pinger
41:59scans the bottom.
42:08Each pass should give
42:09a distinct,
42:10if faint,
42:11image of the tunnels
42:12below.
42:15Most sonars
42:16are used just to
42:17find the bottom.
42:18I want to find
42:19not only the bottom
42:20but what's below
42:21the bottom.
42:22And there are
42:23all kinds of
42:24archeological,
42:25geological things
42:26that are buried
42:27under the bottom
42:28of the ocean.
42:30And the equipment
42:32is marginal.
42:34It helps sometimes,
42:35sometimes it doesn't.
42:36But it's got to be
42:37made better.
42:39And Doc has another
42:40underwater sonar system
42:42which reveals the shape
42:43of objects that stick
42:44up above the ocean floor.
42:46It produces images
42:47like this one
42:48of a sunken ship.
42:49Well, this is a
42:50side-scan sonar
42:51made by EG&G.
42:54And it hangs in the
42:56water from the cable
42:57that Bill's holding up there.
43:00And the sound
43:01comes out of
43:02these black panels.
43:03And it comes out
43:05in a thin dimension
43:07along the travel
43:08and a thick
43:10perpendicular to the travel.
43:11And there's one
43:12on the other side.
43:13So it just goes
43:14through the water
43:15and it presents
43:17a picture
43:18from the surface
43:19of the bottom
43:20from both directions.
43:22It's called a
43:23side-scan
43:24because it does,
43:25it side-scans.
43:26It's a very valuable
43:27instrument because
43:28it shows things
43:29that are sticking up
43:30from the bottom.
43:31They come up
43:32very loud and clear.
43:34I was in Athens
43:36with Cousteau
43:37on an Eclipse
43:38and he came in
43:39one day and said,
43:40Is that side-scan
43:41sonar good for
43:42picking up a ship
43:43that's a thousand feet long?
43:45Think you can find it?
43:47Well, I said,
43:48if I can't,
43:49we'd better go home.
43:50With a sonar,
43:51you ought to be able
43:52to find it in no time.
43:54They were looking
43:55for the HMS Britannic,
43:57a sister ship
43:58of the famed Titanic,
43:59launched just six months
44:00before World War I.
44:02It too was doomed,
44:03sunk by a German mine
44:05off the coast of Greece.
44:11Edgerton joined Cousteau
44:13and the Calypso
44:14in their filmed search
44:15for the Britannic.
44:16The boat's crew
44:17called him Papa Flash.
44:23Hour after hour,
44:25under the watchful eye
44:26of Dr. Harold Edgerton,
44:28famed electronics inventor,
44:30the sonar signals
44:31reveal a lengthening profile
44:33of the sea bottom.
44:42When we went out and looked,
44:43the next time we found it,
44:46it was a long ways
44:47from where anybody ever thought.
44:53There it was,
44:54just as clear and sharp.
44:58And Cousteau dived on it
44:59and took a movie on it.
45:00It's one of his specialty movies.
45:02Fantastic.
45:04He dived on it
45:05with his little submarine
45:06because it's about 350 feet deep.
45:08With his submarine,
45:09he could do it.
45:24And there were other wrecks to find.
45:26The Civil War battle
45:27between the USS Monitor
45:29and the Confederate Merrimack
45:30is legendary in maritime history.
45:33The two iron-clad ships
45:34fought to a standoff in 1866,
45:37each claiming victory.
45:39A year later,
45:40the Monitor fell victim to a storm
45:42and sunk off the coast
45:43of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina.
45:45It was lost to history
45:46for more than 100 years.
45:48Then, in 1973,
45:50Doc decided he'd try to find it.
45:53The Monitor was a Civil War ship.
45:54It was sunk long, long time ago.
45:56A very famous ship.
45:57It had a marvelous history.
45:59And the question was,
46:00where is the Monitor?
46:01And lots of people
46:02had looked for it,
46:03and they claimed they found it.
46:05But when they went back,
46:07other people went back,
46:08there was nothing there.
46:09So it was like Loch Ness Monster.
46:12A lot of people had seen it,
46:13but you can't go back
46:14and pull the body out
46:16and exhibit it.
46:17So I knew that the Monitor
46:19had to be somewhere,
46:21and the question was
46:22how to find it.
46:24We discovered the Monitor
46:25with a side-scan sonar,
46:27and that's a sample
46:28of the side-scan sonar.
46:30That's the kind that found it.
46:32This ship confused them
46:33all the time
46:34because the turret
46:35is underneath it,
46:36and it tipped over
46:37and the turret fell off.
46:38Finally, the archaeologist said,
46:40no, that ship's upside down.
46:43When it went down,
46:44it tipped over
46:45and it went down,
46:46boing, on its tail end
46:47and broke the propeller off.
46:49This is the boiler.
46:52And then it fell
46:54down on top of the turret.
46:59And there it was,
47:00revealed for the first time
47:02by underwater cameras.
47:04Excellent shots.
47:05Look at that.
47:06Some of those corals
47:07are really quite large,
47:08aren't they?
47:09They are.
47:13Boy, that's a good shot
47:14of the gun port.
47:15We really got it.
47:20Yeah, it looks really good, Richard.
47:22Richard, it looks good.
47:25Edgerton's notebooks
47:26are full of the records
47:27of his success.
47:30But as every scientist knows,
47:32for each experiment that works,
47:34there are many failures.
47:36Every experiment's a success,
47:38and the ones that don't work
47:39are really more important
47:40than the ones that do work
47:42because you can check them off.
47:44And I think that's one of the things
47:45that students need to learn
47:46is that most of the things
47:47you do in life are a failure.
47:50When you find out
47:51what your failures are,
47:52then you don't do it that way
47:53next time.
47:54Right now I'm working
47:55on the raindrops.
47:57The student I'm working with
47:58and I want to know
47:59why aren't raindrops bigger
48:01in a certain size.
48:03Okay, you ready?
48:04I'm ready.
48:05Let's go.
48:08Okay, everything's on.
48:09Everything's on.
48:11Okay, go.
48:18Really?
48:21Well, let's develop the film
48:22and see what happens.
48:23The thing I really like
48:24about working with Doc
48:25is that he doesn't feel like
48:26he needs to have
48:28half a million dollars
48:29worth of expensive equipment
48:30to do the sort of research
48:31that he likes to do.
48:33All the questions
48:34that he likes to answer,
48:35all the questions that he asks
48:36are fundamental questions
48:37about what occurs in nature,
48:39things that people
48:40haven't seen before,
48:41things that people,
48:42that at least he's
48:43interested in seeing.
48:44Turn on the lights, Peter.
48:48Each new roll of film
48:49that we develop
48:50is a chance to learn
48:51something new about
48:52the thing that we're studying.
48:54We first started
48:55on this problem
48:56over the summer
48:57and all we were doing
48:58was we were pouring water
48:59down a staircase
49:00in one of the buildings
49:01over here at MIT.
49:03Just Doc downstairs
49:04with a camera
49:05and me upstairs with a pump
49:06and we were spraying it
49:07over the edge of a railing.
49:08And as we got more
49:09and more involved with this,
49:10it got more sophisticated.
49:11Well, we got a more
49:12uniform exposure
49:13with that heavier diffuser.
49:16He's putting scratches
49:17on the film here.
49:19It's an exciting process
49:20for Doc because
49:21for Doc it's a chance
49:22to learn something
49:23he hasn't learned yet.
49:24There we go.
49:25There we go.
49:26There we go.
49:27He wants to turn on the lights
49:28even before the film
49:29is fixed completely
49:30just because he wants
49:31to see it already.
49:32Even when the film
49:33hasn't cleared
49:34and it's still white
49:35in the fixer
49:36and I'm cringing
49:37because I'm thinking about
49:38oh no, the film's
49:39going to be ruined.
49:40He's got it up
49:41against the light
49:42and he's looking at it
49:43with his loop
49:44Okay, so here comes
49:45the drop
49:46falling through the field
49:47kabam.
49:48Beautiful, look at that.
49:49Now it's breaking away
49:50into small drops.
49:51Right.
49:52Beautiful.
49:53He's got a lot of ideas
49:54that he wants to
49:55follow through with
49:56and when he wants
49:57to do something
49:58he says, well,
49:59come on, let's go.
50:00And when he doesn't
50:01want to do something
50:02he says, well,
50:03I'm retired.
50:04And that's how he gets
50:05out of a lot of things
50:06that gives him
50:07the free time.
50:08In a sense,
50:09he's more happy
50:10now that he's retired
50:11than when he would
50:12have to teach a class
50:13or go to school
50:14or something like that.
50:15I think that's
50:16one of the reasons
50:17why he's so happy
50:18that he's retired.
50:19I think that's
50:20one of the reasons
50:21why he's so happy
50:22that he's retired.
50:23I think that's
50:24one of the reasons
50:25why he's so happy
50:26that he's retired.
50:27I think that's
50:28one of the reasons
50:29why he's so happy
50:30that he's retired.
50:31I think that's
50:32one of the reasons
50:33why he's so happy
50:34that he's retired.
50:35I think that's
50:36one of the reasons
50:37why he's so happy
50:38that he's retired.
50:39I think that's
50:40one of the reasons
50:41why he's so happy
50:42that he's retired.
50:43I think that's
50:44one of the reasons
50:45why he's so happy
50:46that he's retired.
50:47I think that's
50:48one of the reasons
50:49why he's so happy
50:50that he's retired.
50:51I think that's
50:52one of the reasons
50:53why he's so happy
50:54that he's retired.
50:55I think that's
50:56one of the reasons
50:57why he's so happy
50:58that he's retired.
50:59I think that's
51:00one of the reasons
51:01why he's so happy
51:02that he's retired.
51:03I think that's
51:04one of the reasons
51:05why he's so happy
51:06that he's retired.
51:07I think that's
51:08one of the reasons
51:09why he's so happy
51:10that he's retired.
51:11It really takes
51:12an amazingly brief time
51:13to pull the
51:14equipment together
51:15to get the
51:16animals to cooperate
51:17and bam,
51:18you have an answer
51:19to something that
51:20you've probably
51:21been puzzling over
51:22for the last 10 years.
51:26All right,
51:27puff real hard.
51:29Harder.
51:31All right,
51:32go.
51:34Great.
51:35Great.
51:36Yep, there he goes.
51:37There he goes.
51:38All right.
51:39Yep.
51:40Yep.
51:41All right.
51:42All right.
51:43Hello.
51:44That's it.
51:45You know,
51:46four years we're in the dark,
51:47now we'll finally
51:48know what's going on.
51:49Well, good luck.
51:50It went so fast
51:51I couldn't really see
51:52what was going on.
51:53Huh?
51:54No.
51:55Go ahead,
51:56look at the movies,
51:57see what happens.
51:58At normal speed,
51:59all we see is
52:00that the food disappears.
52:01The high-speed camera
52:02slows down the action.
52:03Let's see it again.
52:06The biologist
52:07will study the film
52:08frame by frame
52:09to better understand
52:10the mechanics
52:11of how the fish eat.
52:14I think you know
52:15that we're having
52:16an open house
52:17for our graduate students
52:18in September.
52:19You might want to
52:20log that into your...
52:21What's the date?
52:22When I first came to MIT,
52:23I walked into
52:24Doc Edison's office
52:25and I found
52:26his whole life work
52:27here displayed
52:28before me.
52:29And when I went out
52:30into our laboratory,
52:31I found all of the things
52:32that had interested him
52:33from high-speed photography
52:34to sonars
52:35and everything else
52:36that he was interested
52:37in,
52:38to sonars.
52:42He's a many-faceted man
52:44and many, many people
52:45that meet him
52:46are able to identify
52:47with him.
52:49And he gets the echoes back.
52:51Many students come here
52:52and think that
52:53there is nothing
52:54left to be done.
52:55Everything has been found.
52:57Everything has been invented.
52:58And he doesn't believe that.
53:02And this particular bat
53:03took his own picture
53:05by flying through
53:06this beam of light.
53:07And I was really proud of this
53:08and I took it into my class.
53:10And one kid in the back
53:11says,
53:12Hey, why don't you try
53:13to get a picture of the bat
53:14catching a bug?
53:17And I said,
53:18Well, that's impossible.
53:20It's enough trouble
53:21just to get the bat
53:22in the focus
53:23but to get the bug
53:24in the bat...
53:25So the next class,
53:26this student
53:27came in
53:28with a worm-shooting cannon.
53:33Dave Callender
53:35Here's his worm-shooting cannon.
53:38So there's no problem
53:39to get a bat in a worm.
53:40See it?
53:41See it?
53:42No problem.
53:43From this picture,
53:44scientists learn
53:45that bats don't catch prey
53:46in their mouths
53:47but scoop them out of the air
53:48with their tail membranes.
53:51Alright, move it
53:52just a little bit.
53:54And just a trifle more.
53:57That's good.
54:00I've worked with Doc
54:01for nearly 35 years.
54:05He's always the leader.
54:07He knows what he wants to do
54:08and he wants to do it quickly.
54:12Doc looks at time
54:13in terms of microseconds.
54:16And a student will come in
54:19and he'll ask some of Doc's time
54:21and Doc will say,
54:22Okay, I'll give you
54:23five microseconds.
54:35Doc's Microseconds
54:44Well, I think
54:45having an interest in something
54:46is very important in life.
54:47You have to get up in the morning
54:48and want to do it.
54:49And I used to tell people,
54:50if you don't wake up
54:51at three o'clock in the morning
54:52and you want to do something,
54:54you're wasting your time.
55:00Time is very precious.
55:03We're wasting it right now.
55:07I got through to you, didn't I?
55:33This episode of NOVA repeats Sunday
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