Word: hit
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...February 1928 the little nine-piece band had made a big hit with dance fans, and was all set to make an even bigger one. For their first appearance on a vaudeville bill in Chicago's Palace Theater, they had a wow comic-hat routine to go with I Wish I Was In Peoria and a noisy harness gag for Thanks for the Buggy Ride. But they put their new act on only once. Stormed the theater manager: "For the $4,000 a week we're paying you, we can get a good comedian for every...
...altitude of 95 miles. The most important man in the act, at least to innocent bystanders, was Herbert L. Karsch, flight safety officer. Karsch's job is to keep rockets from leaving the 90-by-35-mile area of uninhabited desert and mountains where they are supposed to hit. The authorities would consider it unfortunate, for instance, if a wandering rocket were to smack El Paso...
...only a fortnight later, a V-2 went wild internationally. It hit four miles from the center of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico (pop. 48,881), made a fearful bang and dug a crater 24 feet deep and 40 feet in diameter. No one was hurt, and the people of Juarez, enjoying their spring fiesta, thought the bang was part of the show. But the diplomatic repercussions were painful. The White Sands brass, covered with cold sweat, told Karsch to work out a system for riding herd on rockets...
Watchful Brain. Karsch's simple safety screen has worked well, but recently he got a better gadget: an "Impact Predictor," which can tell in advance just where each rocket will hit. Two observers track the rocket with telescopes. The information from the stations is fed automatically into an electronic brain (analogue computer) which can solve complicated equations almost instantaneously...
Through its two telescopic eyes, the brain watches the rocket. Out of the brain flow figures which show accurately where the rocket will hit. Safety Director Karsch watches these figures. If they should coincide, for instance, with the position of Albuquerque, he could cut off the fuel, change the course of the rocket, and save that unsuspecting city...