O Say Can You See?

Technicolor sets the scene

Editor's note: Worn by 16-year-old Judy Garland during the filming of The Wizard of Oz, the Ruby Slippers are one of the most popular and treasured artifacts at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. They will be off view October 9 through November 20 in order to be part of a special exhibition on Hollywood at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, England. The Ruby Slippers will be home for the holidays and return to public view November 21. In the meantime, we explore how the slippers got their ruby color.

"Within a short time she was walking briskly toward the Emerald City, her silver shoes tinkling merrily on the hard, yellow roadbed. The sun shone bright and the birds sang sweet and Dorothy…"

In the original book, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, author L. Frank Baum gave the Wicked Witch of the East a pair of powerful silver shoes that became Dorothy's when her Kansas farmhouse dropped out of the sky and landed squarely on the witch. Whether or not Baum meant those silver shoes skipping down a golden road as a commentary on the late-19th-century debate over basing American currency on a gold or silver standard (more on the book's political context here), his vision of silver shoes remained intact in early versions of the screenplay for the classic 1939 film, The Wizard of Oz. Yet the shoes were certainly not silver in the final film. While we may never be certain why Baum chose silver, we do know exactly why Dorothy's shoes became a pair of sequin-covered, iridescent ruby slippers in the movie. The answer: Technicolor.

Technicolor Camera, around 1938

Inventors and MIT graduates Herbert Kalmus and Daniel Comstock, and the technically adept W. Burton Wescott founded Technicolor in 1915 (the "Tech" in Technicolor was a nod to Kalmus and Comstock’s alma mater). In 1938, Kalmus spoke about the beginnings of the company: "The earliest Technicolor laboratory was built within a railway car. This car was completely equipped with a photochemical laboratory, darkrooms, fireproof safes, power plant, offices, and all the machinery and apparatus necessary for continuously carrying on the following processes on a small commercial scale; sensitizing, testing, perforating, developing, washing, fixing and drying positive; printing, developing, washing, and conditioning air; filtering and cooling wash water; examining and splicing film; and making control measurements and tests."

Dorothy's Ruby Slippers, 1938

Herbert Kalmus and his team continued to tweak the invention through several iterations before it reached its full glory in the 1930s. Technicolor Process Number Four, or 3-strip Technicolor, used in The Wizard of Oz, wasn’t a type of film, though. Instead, the action was filmed with a modified motion-picture camera that contained a prism and colored filters that, in turn, separated the scene onto three different strips of black-and-white negative film. Each strip correlated to the filtered colors and was used to create an intermediary strip called a matrix. In a method similar to lithography, the matrices were then used to print the final movies that were distributed to theaters. Making a Technicolor feature film was such a complex undertaking that movie studios were required to hire specially trained Technicolor staff to oversee production. These included color consultants, under the direction of Natalie Kalmus, Herbert's ex-wife.

A former art student, Natalie became the ultimate mediator between the lab and the silver screen, unwavering in her commitment to make Technicolor shine. She made decisions about makeup, costumes, sets, and lighting, and even went behind the camera as a cinematographer a few times. She controlled (some say with an iron fist) the aura of Technicolor, describing her role as "playing ringmaster to the rainbow."

Natalie Kalmus was the Technicolor consultant on The Wizard of Oz set. We don't know if she played a part in transforming Baum's silver shoes into ruby slippers or if costume designer Gilbert Adrian and screenwriter Noel Langley came to the decision independent of her influence. But with one seemingly simple change, an American icon was born.

The museum's collections are rich in artifacts from The Wizard of Oz and the Technicolor era, and the Ruby Slippers are among our most visited treasures. The image of Dorothy clicking those sequined heels together three times, repeating, "There’s no place like home," is part of our shared memory. Would the Ruby Slippers have attained such star status if they had remained silver?

Joyce Bedi is Senior Historian for the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation. This post first appeared on the Center’s blog, Bright Ideas.

The colorful, kinetic world of Charles and Ray Eames

When it comes to inventive uses of color, there is hardly a more inspiring example than the contributions of the late husband-and-wife design team of Charles (1907–1978) and Ray (1912-1988) Eames. Working primarily as a painter before their marriage, Ray Kaiser Eames did much to infuse their shared creations, and through them our everyday lives, with color. For Ray, color was not only an aesthetic technique, but also a communications device, a means of conveying information about objects, spaces, and volumes. She had learned this from her teacher Hans Hofmann, the German-born American abstract expressionist, known for his brightly hued canvases.

While we owe a great deal to the Eameses for brightening and enlivening our everyday lives, they were especially influential in the world of museums. The collections of many art and design museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, boast not only of vibrantly colored plastic and fiberglass Eames chairs, but also of incredibly innovative seating like the "potato chip" chair. Its unique shape depended on new molding techniques that the Eameses developed during World War II for producing plywood splints for wounded soldiers. Lesser-known, though, are the many exhibitions that they designed for museums and world's fairs.

Chair Designed by Charles Eames and Eero Saarinen for the "Organic Design in Home Furnishings" Competition, designed 1940, molded plywood, wood, foam rubber, and fabric. Courtesy of Vitra Design Museum.

The Eameses were really all about communication and information, employing design primarily as a public-education tool. In their hands, exhibitions evolved into powerful informational and educational vehicles. Their famous Mathematica exhibition, on the art of mathematics, was sponsored by IBM and debuted in 1961 at the California Museum of Science and Industry. Parts of it are still on display in science museums today, and IBM released an iPad app based on the exhibition last year. The Eameses were also instrumental in introducing films into exhibitions, regarding motion pictures as an indispensable educational technology. Their long and close relationship with IBM produced films for IBM's pavilions at the 1958 Brussels World's Fair and the New York World's Fair of 1964.

The Smithsonian benefited from Charles and Ray's talents, too. One of my first encounters with the creative work of these geniuses was in the 1970s at the National Museum of History and Technology (now the National Museum of American History). Despite the passage of several decades, I still have vivid memories of an exhibition on historic toys designed by Barbara Charles from the Eames office. It was fun, whimsical, and a visual feast in its use of color. Especially memorable, however, was the accompanying short film, Toccata for Toy Trains, originally produced in 1957 by the couple themselves (Ray was given top billing). Lushly colorful, particularly in the seductive use of reds, and with a musical score by renowned film composer Elmer Bernstein, the movie was shot from the intimate perspective of real toy trains (and not scale-model trains—a significant difference). It drew you completely into the world of toys, long before Pixar came on the scene.

But the Eameses' relationship with the Smithsonian was even more fundamental. According to Benjamin Lawless, the longtime design head of the National Museum of History and Technology, Charles Eames was a favorite of then–Smithsonian Secretary S. Dillon Ripley. Ripley persuaded Eames to produce an hour-long film about the Institution, and, in the early 1970s, Eames in turn convinced Ripley to establish a film unit at the Smithsonian. The Eames office even sent an experienced staff member to the Smithsonian for a year to help get the unit off the ground. It became a pioneering museum film studio, known for such productions as the Emmy Award–winning film for the Smithsonian’s 1876 exhibit, designed by Bill Miner, another veteran of the Eames office.

 

S. Dillon Ripley, eighth Smithsonian Secretary (1964-1984), standing in the Secretary’s Parlor in the Smithsonian Institution Building in front of the portrait of Joseph Henry, first Secretary of the Smithsonian (1846-1878). Image from Smithsonian Institution Archives.

 

Charles and Ray Eames and their associates brought color, motion, and life to Smithsonian exhibition halls, and helped museums in general become modern educational organizations. In all of their projects, color was a strategic tool; never did they apply hues indiscriminately. Rather, their brilliant palette spotlighted salient points of information that they wanted to convey, capturing both the eyes and minds of viewers.

To learn more about the Eameses' style, you can visit the Eames house and studio in Los Angeles, California, a symphony of color and colorful objects that they collected or used in their varied projects. Their papers reside at the Library of Congress, which produced a lively online exhibit, The Work of Charles and Ray Eames: A Legacy of Invention. The accompanying catalog under the same title (Harry N. Abrams, 1997) includes insightful essays about their design philosophy and widespread influence.

Art Molella is director of the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the National Museum of American History. This column originally appeared on the Center’s blog, Bright Ideas.

I’ll take that drink to go!

Editor's Note: Re-posted from Bright Ideas, the blog of the Smithsonian's Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation, this post describes the detailed creative process behind an invention most of us soda-swilling, coffee-sipping car drivers and passengers take for granted today. 

Inventors draw and sketch as part of their process of working out an idea. Drawing moves the idea from the inventor’s mind to the paper, making it seem more possible. Sketches and drawings can also convince others that something will work—before it is actually built or manufactured. This makes them a particularly important part of the patent application package.

A great example of this critical supporting material is found in the A. Bernie Wood Papers in the Museum's Archives Center. Arthur Bernie Wood (1921-1986) was an advertising designer, consultant, and inventor actively involved in the development of the restaurant franchise industry in America during the 1960s and 1970s. Particularly notable is his work in creating, promoting, and merchandising the new fast-food corporate image of McDonald's (read more about Wood in the finding aid to his papers).

In addition to his work for restaurant
chains, Wood also held a number  of patents, including one for a "Beverage Cup-Holder for Motor-Vehicle Doors" (U.S. Patent 3,128,983). Today we take cup holders in vehicles for granted—I think my minivan has ten cup holders, perhaps more. But this indispensable feature wasn't common in the early 1960s. Involved as he was in the growing fast-food industry, it might seem obvious that Wood would wonder where drive-thru patrons might put their drinks as they drove off with a sack of burgers and fries. Wood stated in his patent, “Apart from the floor of the vehicle there hardly is a level place where on to set a cup without fear of it being upset.” While other solutions to this problem were already available, Wood believed he could do better.

What makes Wood’s patent interesting to me is not the idea of a cup holder itself, but the amount of archival documentation supporting it. Patent "jackets" are specialized folders that contain standard information such as patent number, actions, references, assignment, application serial number, and fees paid. The jacket also typically contains correspondence with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, foreign patent and trademark offices, the inventor/designer, company attorneys, and other company officials; as well as drawings and photographs. In Wood’s case, the patent jacket contains substantial sketches and prototypes that trace the evolution of his idea for a practical cup holder.

Wood’s sketches and paper prototypes provide insight into his inventive process and help us understand how he worked out his idea. He created numerous paper templates and annotated those with measurements and directions on how to fold and assemble the cup holder. The images seen here include pencil sketches, which were first transformed into paper templates, and then into finished patent drawings. The black-and-white image shows the beverage cup holder in Wood’s car.

We don't know if Wood’s cup holder was ever manufactured or if the patent was licensed. But I feel certain that Wood would have loved my ten cup holder minivan.

Follow A. Bernie Wood's invention process—from sketch to patent to beverage on the go—below:

Follow A. Bernie Wood's invention process--from sketch to patent

Alison Oswald is an archivist with the Smithsonian's Archives Center/Lemelson Center 

Much more than a garage, a Place of Invention

Early in May, as spring rain deluged the car, I quickly lowered the window to snap one photo of a modest garage on 19th Avenue Northeast in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Surely observers would have wondered what was notable about this particular garage. Well, nothing actually, but formerly it was the site of the Hermundslie family’s garage where Medtronic, now a leading multinational medical technology company, was born. Like more famous garages in Silicon Valley that begat Apple and Hewlett Packard, the former 800-square-foot garage (made out of two railway boxcars!) served as a convenient, no-rent location for brothers-in-law Palmer Hermundslie and Earl Bakken to found their company in 1949. Their primary business was servicing electrical medical equipment, earning manager Palmer and technician Earl a whopping $8 in revenue during their company’s first year.

19th Ave NE garage today (top) and Medtronic Garage in 1930 (bottom).

Inside the humble garage in 1957, Earl drew schematics on envelopes and grocery bags during an unbelievably short four-week development process of the first wearable, external, battery-powered transistorized pacemaker at the behest of Dr. C. Walton Lillehei, “the father of open-heart surgery,” at the University of Minnesota’s Variety Heart Hospital. “[The] prototype, housed in aluminum and containing only two transistors, had been intended for tests with dogs but was used on human patients within days of its invention. Soon afterward, Bakken and his employees introduced a more refined version of the transistor pacemaker in a black plastic shell; about ten of these went into clinical use at the University. Later in 1958, Medtronic began manufacturing a commercial version in white plastic—the ‘5800’. All three versions were essentially identical in circuitry and other interior features.”¹ This was just the beginning, as Medtronic really boomed after purchasing rights in 1960 to produce and market the implantable pacemaker developed by and named for inventor Wilson Greatbatch and surgeon Dr. William Chardack.


Earl Bakken working inside the Medtronic Garage, around 1955.

Our garage drive-by was the first stop during a tour of Earl Bakken and Medtronic history-related sites courtesy of my expert guide, Dr. David Rhees, Executive Director of The Bakken Museum. David is a long-time advisor to the Museum’s Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation where I work, and he was thrilled that we plan to feature Minneapolis/St. Paul, a.k.a. “Medical Alley,” in our Places of Invention exhibition. Since this case study highlights the invention of the wearable pacemaker by Earl Bakken, I was interested in learning more about key sites in Earl’s life and work as part of my research about Medical Alley. One of my favorite stories is about how young Earl (born in 1924) was inspired to become an electrical engineer after seeing Boris Karloff’s 1931 “Frankenstein” at the Heights Theatre on Central Avenue near his childhood home in Minneapolis. So in the pouring rain David drove me by Earl’s house and then on to the now-renovated theatre to take photos. He told me about how fun it was to help Earl celebrate his 85th birthday with a special screening of the 1931 movie there. Our next stop was at Medtronic’s world headquarters where Earl still maintains an office even though he is nominally retired and lives in Hawaii. I got a kick out of seeing two Frankenstein figures on his desk.

Although my Places of Invention exhibition research has been focusing on the 1950s and 1960s and particularly this pacemaker invention story, I enjoy learning more about how Medical Alley, Minnesota, has continued to grow and change as a hot spot for medical technology through today. Again, David proved to be an excellent guide, arranging a meeting with Dale Wahlstrom, President and CEO of LifeScience Alley (formerly Medical Alley, which merged with Minnesota’s Biotechnology Industry Organization in 2005), and his colleagues Liz Rammer and Ryan Baird, who shared information and insights into the “ecosystem” in Minnesota that continues to support and encourage invention and innovation. David also introduced me to Minnetronix staff, including President and CEO Rich Nazarian and Vice President for Corporate Affairs Jonathan Pierce, who were visiting The Bakken Museum that day, giving me the opportunity to ask them directly about what it is like living and working today in Medical Alley.


Bakken pacemaker, courtesy of the Bakken Museum.

A key message that came through loud and clear during my tour with David and talks with others is that the medical industry in the Twin Cities was and is a “tight-knit community” that combines the “delivery and technology sides”² of medical innovation. While I continue to study its history, I look forward to keeping an eye on the future of Medical Alley, Minnesota, and seeing what amazing new technologies may emerge from this fascinating place of invention.

¹ Rhees, David, and Kirk Jeffrey. "Earl Bakken’s Little White Box: The Complex Meanings of the First Transistorized Pacing and Pacemaker.” In Exposing Electronics, edited by Bernard Finn. London: Harwood, 2000, p. 1.
²Quotes from Dale Wahlstrom, LifeScience Alley, and Rich Nazarian, Minnetronix, respectively (talks with Monica on 5/3/12).

Monica Smith is Exhibition Program Manager and Project Director for the Places of Invention exhibition at the Lemelson Center. In researching for the exhibition, Monica has also visited Hartford, Connecticut, and Fort Collins, Colorado. This blog first appeared on the Center’s blog, Bright Ideas.

Impromptu breakdancing…to video game music?

On the opening weekend of The Art of Video Games at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, my boyfriend and I lounged in the museum’s courtyard listening to the musical duo 8-Bit Weapon. They were playing chip music—a style that sounds like robotic electronic music. I was surprised when a few people got up from the crowd and started breakdancing. I thought breakdancing was done to hip-hop music on the street or at a party—not to video game music at an art museum. I was also surprised because I’ve been reading about breakdancing as part of my research into the origins of hip-hop music in the Bronx for the Lemelson Center’s upcoming exhibit on Places of Invention, and I didn’t expect my professional life to pop up in my personal life.

Part of why breakdancing in the museum courtyard seemed so unusual to me is that it’s so closely associated with hip-hop, not robotic-like music with auto tuners. After all, breakdancing was instrumental in the development of hip-hop music. Breakdancers flail their limbs, spin on their heads, and bounce their back or stomach off the ground. Dancers and observers encouraged DJ’s to try to extend the instrumental sections (breaks) of songs to allow individual dancers to showcase their talents. To extend the breaks, DJs invented ways of manipulating sound systems—turning the record player from a passive device that replays sound to an active instrument that creates sound. Record players no longer just played recorded music but, with the help of gifted DJs, created scratching noises, mixes of different breaks from different songs, and big, fat beats. Compared with electronic music, that’s a pretty different sound to dance to. Do the two types of music have a connection?

From Yes Yes Y'all by Jim Fricke and Charlie Ahearn. Photo by Henry Chalfant.

Breakdancing and hip-hop developed during the 1970s and early ‘80s in the Bronx neighborhood of New York City. It was during this same time period that the first generations of video game home consoles were being developed. Ralph Baer (whose documents are in the museum’s archives) developed the first console and released it to the public in 1972. Soon games were developed for both computers and consoles, and game systems like Atari and Magnovox came on the market. In the late ’70s, new consoles came out with clones of popular arcade games such as Space Invaders, Frogger, Pac-Man, and Donkey Kong. The consoles made in the early ’80s, such as Nintendo, had sound chips built into the systems to produce sound. Such early games used a continuous background soundtrack on a loop. These sounds and soundtracks form the basis of chip music—music created from vintage computers and video game consoles. Chip music composers such as the duo I heard in the courtyard, or the group interviewed for the Lemelson’s podcast series, Anamanaguchi, use sound mixers to mix, match, and manipulate sounds from sound chips to create songs. It’s a deconstruction and repurposing of video game music, which since the ‘80s, has evolved to become symphonic (like the music described in the first interview of the Lemelson’s podcast).

Breakdancing, video games, and computer-generated music were inventions from the same time period. More importantly, chip music is created using the techniques created by hip-hop music. In retrospect, their intersection at The Art of Video Games makes sense—breakdancing inspired hip-hop music, which created instruments and techniques that made it possible to create chip music, whose play on the day of the exhibit opening inspired people to breakdance. I’m really struck, and find it inspiring, that my research came to life in front of me, that it did so to video game music, and that it happened at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Watch the video

Laurel Fritzsch is a project assistant with the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation.