Word: gadget
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Since the introduction of the magnetometer, an anti-skyjacking gadget that looks like a pair of mechanical bean poles, the most intriguing refuse is found in washrooms and wastebaskets at major airports. Says Jay Adsen, FAA security chief at Los Angeles International Airport: "It's really amazing, the things people carry around with them." Amazing indeed-and more than a little disturbing. At Chicago's O'Hare Airport, federal marshals have scooped up knives, handguns, tear-gas guns and stolen credit cards. In Los Angeles, officials found in a boarding area a jacket containing a .22 revolver...
Oscar and his pals can work fast because of a simple device known in the trade as a "slap hammer." The gadget is essentially a thin steel rod with a movable weight attached to it; inserted into a lock, it can pull the lock tumbler out of a car door in seconds...
...alumni. Some enterprises die aborning. Jerry White, 26, devised a plastic sheathing to protect telephone poles from woodpeckers but found it too expensive to produce. Other students are still gamely trying to develop a drown-proof infant bathtub, a self-testing kit for lung cancer and a transistorized gadget that would automatically squirt out air freshener every few minutes. But, as Bob Lyle, the 30-year-old acting dean, points out, even failure teaches students something about business...
...claims for the gadget-laden crib typify a growing trend in child psychology toward forced early education and "programmed enrichment." Now Harvard Pediatrician Richard Feinbloom has strongly urged the American Academy of Pediatrics to take a stand against it. At the organization's recent annual meeting, he maintained that elaborate educational toys for infants are no be' er playthings than pots and pans. As a matter of fact, he said, their use, especially in the elaborate new "crib environments," may endanger normal intellectual and emotional development...
...Mountains to the east. The train climbs continually to the Continental Divide crossing at Gonzales. "Back in the days of hand-fired steam locomotives, we were real glad to get here," says Ray Derksen, acting train master at Gallup. Derksen points out a hotbox detector at trackside, an infrared gadget that spots defective wheel bearings; one installation can cost as much as $50,000, but a single derailment caused by a hot box can be much more expensive...