Gadgets used & being used by our generation :
It must be true for all
times but our generation definitely have seen most of the developments of
gadgets.. So many that it may be difficult to name all of them, however I try
to recollect and put my memory with a little of history attached with them.
When I was a kid say in
1955 our house had no electricity but we had 2 gadgets meant for entertainment:
First in my list is a valve radio which
ran on a pile battery ( I think it was 110 V DC).The radio - probably a Murphy-
was in a working condition, but many times needed battery replacement from
Patna, only elders used to enjoy predominantly Sehgal songs. Later we got more
modern radio working on electricity.
Second on my list is a gramophone in our house which used to play earliest 78 rpm
records. The gramophone ran on spring charge and the sound will come from
a sound box which used to convert the vibrations sensed by needle to sound
through a diaphragm. Its speed regulator was not working well and sound will be
ok till the spring was charged and later we will hear low frequency notes. The
needle also needed change after every record. We had few of the records along
with EP’s and LP’s of 80’s till our last change of house. We loved the dog with
"his master's voice" sign (HMV) on the records.
T Third on my list is a transistor. One of our neighbors was working in Japan and his family returned with a small wonder which used to
play music. The kids of that household will flash the Nippon transistor with
pride. My uncle (Braj Ballabh Prasad) was a music lover and on his
insistence we somehow made the young boy part with the said gadget for one
hour. We later came to know this gadget in called transistor. The gadget was purchased
much later by us.
Fourth gadget which I came to
enjoy was a short lived version of tape recorder the spool type tape recorder.
In 1967-68 My cousin Late Prof Dr Maya Sinha, went to UK for her PhD. when she
returned she brought a spool type tape recorder. We were thrilled to hear our
voices or songs after it was recorded and played back, Didi will not allow us
to play with this gadget except under her supervision, though by now I was a 3rd year Engineering student.
I will detail out more gadgets in my next blog..
