Energy & Power
The Museum's collections on energy and power illuminate the role of fire, steam, wind, water, electricity, and the atom in the nation's history. The artifacts include wood-burning stoves, water turbines, and windmills, as well as steam, gas, and diesel engines. Oil-exploration and coal-mining equipment form part of these collections, along with a computer that controlled a power plant and even bubble chambers—a tool of physicists to study protons, electrons, and other charged particles.
A special strength of the collections lies in objects related to the history of electrical power, including generators, batteries, cables, transformers, and early photovoltaic cells. A group of Thomas Edison's earliest light bulbs are a precious treasure. Hundreds of other objects represent the innumerable uses of electricity, from streetlights and railway signals to microwave ovens and satellite equipment.
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Laser Level
- Description
- Lasers have proven very useful in the construction industry. One example is this Spectra-Physics model 910 "LaserLevel" made in the early 1980s. In use, a construction worker attached the unit to a tripod and adjusted it so that it was nearly parallel to the ground. The level automatically completed the adjustment process when activated, and then emitted a beam of infrared light from a rotating head. The worker then moved to where-ever a measurement was needed and used a special laser detector to complete the task.
- The "LaserLevel" self-adjusted if bumped slightly and completely shut off if bumped too much. The level operated automatically so it allowed one person to do work of two, resulting in cost savings since fewer assistants were needed.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1985
- maker
- Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc.
- ID Number
- 1985.0417.01
- accession number
- 1985.0417
- catalog number
- 1985.0417.01
- model number
- 910
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Ruby Laser
- Description
- Lasers have served as teaching tools in more ways than one. This ruby laser, made by General Electric (GE), inspired teenager Ebe Helm from New Jersey to learn more about lasers.
- Mr. Helm wrote: "this laser head was originally on display in the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia as part of an electromagnetic spectrum exhibit from GE. It was a working unit that would fire downward on a spool of typewriter ribbon when a button was pushed. The hole it burned could be observed from several angles around its display and through large magnifying lenses arranged over it. ... I first saw this laser on display during a class trip in 1972. The laser had been on display for some years, possibly since the 1960's, and was not working. After it had been removed to a basement store room I managed to talk the Franklin Institute into giving it to me in 1976. I used the components to make an operational ruby laser in 1977 at age 17."
- Mr. Helm donated this laser, and several others, to the Smithsonian in 2005.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1978
- maker
- General Electric Company
- ID Number
- 2005.0034.01
- catalog number
- 2005.0034.01
- accession number
- 2005.0034
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Helium-Neon Laser Discharge Apparatus
- Description
- This is the discharge unit for the third type of laser invented. Dr. Ali Javan and his colleagues William Bennett and Donald Herriott demonstrated this laser at Bell Labs in December 1960. Using a mixture of helium and neon gasses, this laser emitted a continuous beam of light at 1.153 nano-meters, in the near-infrared part of the spectrum. Their successful demonstration proved crucial for many applications. The first supermarket scanners, made by Spectra Physics, used a helium-neon laser, as have many other commercial devices.
- Ali Javan came to the U.S. from Iran in 1948 and trained in the laboratory of maser inventor Charles H. Townes at Columbia University. When he received his Ph.D. in 1954, Javan went to work at Bell Labs where began investigating the possibility of making a laser using a gaseous medium. His laser was the first gas laser as well as the first laser to produce a continuous beam of radiation.
- date made
- 1960
- maker
- Javan, Ali
- ID Number
- 2008.0153.01
- accession number
- 2008.0153
- catalog number
- 2008.0153.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Wave guide with ruby crystal
- Description
- This is an experimental device made by Theodore Maiman at Hughes Aircraft in late 1959 or early 1960 as part of the series of experiments leading up to the demonstration of the first laser in May 1960. This object features a cube-shaped ruby crystal mounted at one end of a microwave wave-guide. Maiman sought to test the response of the synthetic ruby crystal to microwave stimulation. Other researchers claimed that ruby would be a poor material to use in a laser. Maiman thought otherwise.
- After Charles Townes invented the microwave-emitting maser in 1954, researchers began trying to move to the higher energy levels of infrared and visible light. They referred to such devices as "optical masers," and only later did people adopt Gordon Gould's term, "laser." This experimental piece clearly shows the influence of microwave technology. The metal tube is not a stand but rather a hollow guide that channels microwaves to the ruby crystal. The results of this and other experiments led Maiman to ultimately choose a cylinder of ruby rather than a cube for his laser.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1959
- associated date
- 1960
- associated user
- unknown
- associated institution
- Hughes Research Laboratories
- maker
- Maiman, Theodore H.
- Hughes Aircraft Company
- ID Number
- EM.330052
- accession number
- 288813
- catalog number
- 330052
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Home-made Laser
- Description
- This carbon-dioxide gas laser was assembled and operated in 1979 by teenager Ebe Helm in the basement of his parent's New Jersey home. As Helm told museum staff, "The laser operated at 9000 volts, 120 milliamps, on alternating current. Because my gas supply was very limited, it functioned as a static, non-flowing gas laser. It did not function at the expected pressure of 4-10 torr, but only above 60 torr, well off the range of the vacuum gage I was using. The target is a building block donated from the nursery school that my mother operated from our home."
- Mr. Helm donated this and other lasers to the Smithsonian in 2005.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1979
- maker
- Helm, Ebe
- ID Number
- 2005.0034.02
- catalog number
- 2005.0034.02
- accession number
- 2005.0034
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Prototype Excimer Laser
- Description
- Ralph Burnham and Nick Djeu made this prototype excimer laser in mid-1975 while at the Naval Research Laboratory. A modified carbon-dioxide laser known as a TEA laser (Transversely Excited, Atmospheric pressure), this laser used a mixture of xenon and fluoride gasses to produce a pulse of ultraviolet laser light. Ultraviolet light has a shorter wavelength than visible light and thus a higher energy level.
- The term "excimer" refers to a molecule of two identical atoms that remains stable when in an excited state. The first laser to use such molecules was made in Moscow in 1970 and used molecules consisting of two xenon atoms. Lasers using molecules of differing atoms (technically called an exciplex-laser) were made by several teams of researchers in the US early in 1975. Burnham and Djeu's breakthrough lay in using a commercially available TEA laser to generate the excimer laser pulse. Their apparatus was much smaller and used less energy than prior excimer lasers that were energized by electron-beams.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- ca 1976
- maker
- Naval Research Laboratory
- ID Number
- 1996.0343.01
- accession number
- 1996.0343
- catalog number
- 1996.0343.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Head Piece from Maiman Laser
- Description
- This object may be the first laser. It was made by Theodore Maiman and his assistant Irnee D'Haenens at Hughes Aircraft Company in May 1960.
- In 1959 Maiman attended a technical conference on the subject of lasers. Maiman heard several speakers state that ruby was unsuitable for a laser but grew troubled by some of the numbers they cited. When he returned to his lab at Hughes he began experimenting. By May 1960 he and D'Haenens constructed several small metal cylinders. Each contained a photographer's spiral-shaped, xenon flashlamp that surrounded a small cylindrical crystal of synthetic ruby. When they fired the flashlamp, the burst of light stimulated the ruby crystal to emit a tightly focused pulse of light--the first operating laser.
- Hughes Aircraft donated this and several other pieces of Maiman's apparatus to the Smithsonian in 1970. The crystal mounted inside this unit is from a 1961 experiment. While the donation records indicate that this is the first laser, Maiman wrote that he received the first laser as a gift when he left the company in April 1961. Several experimental models were made during the research, a common practice. So we may never know which unit actually generated the first laser light.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1960
- associated date
- 1960
- maker
- Maiman, Theodore H.
- Hughes Aircraft Company
- ID Number
- EM.330050
- accession number
- 288813
- catalog number
- 330050
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Experimental Ruby Laser
- Description
- This is an experimental ruby laser made in 1963 at Ohio State University. Edward Damon, a researcher at the University’s Antenna Laboratory, made this and several other lasers during his investigation of Theodore Maiman’s ruby laser experiments of three years earlier.
- In addition to replicating Maiman's 1960 experiments, Damon wished to explore variations of the ruby laser. Unlike Maiman's laser, this laser does not use a spiral flashlamp to energize the ruby crystal. Instead, Damon placed three linear flashlamps parallel to the rod-shaped laser crystal. Firing these lamps simultaneously provided energy to the crystal. The laser also demonstrates a water cooling technique still used in some lasers today.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1963
- ID Number
- 2009.0228.02
- accession number
- 2009.0228
- catalog number
- 2009.0228.02
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Home-made Laser
- Description
- The term “home-made laser” almost seems a contradiction but that is not the case. This gas laser was built by high school student Stephen M. Fry in 1964, only four years after Ali Javan made the first gas laser at Bell Labs. Fry followed plans published in Scientific American's "The Amateur Scientist" column in September 1964, (page 227).
- The glass tube is filled with helium and neon and, as the magazine reported, "seems to consist merely of a gas-discharge tube that looks much like the letter 'I' in a neon sign; at the ends of the tube are flat windows that face a pair of small mirrors. Yet when power is applied, the device emits as many as six separate beams of intense light."
- The discharge tube is the only piece of this particular laser that remains. The flat windows (called "Brewster windows") are square instead of round, and the electrodes are parallel to the gas tube instead of perpendicular. Otherwise it resembles the drawings in the magazine. Fry later earned a Ph.D. in physics with a dissertation on lasers.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1964
- date ordered, given, or borrowed
- 1985-03-15
- maker
- Fry, Stephen M.
- ID Number
- 1985.0269.01
- accession number
- 1985.0269
- catalog number
- 1985.0269.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Experimental Ruby Laser
- Description
- This is an experimental ruby laser made in 1963 at Ohio State University. Edward Damon, a researcher at the University’s Antenna Laboratory, made this and several other lasers during his investigation of Theodore Maiman’s successful ruby laser experiments of three years earlier.
- An important part of science consists of replicating the experiments conducted by other researchers and confirming their results. Like Maiman's 1960 laser, Damon's 1963 laser used a photographer's helical flashlamp to energize the ruby crystal. It demonstrated the use of mirrors external to the ruby rod instead of mirrors deposited in the crystal itself. The mirrors are on adjustable mounts that allowed Damon to make a variety of experiments with this unit.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1963
- maker
- Ohio State University
- ID Number
- 2009.0228.01
- accession number
- 2009.0228
- catalog number
- 2009.0228.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Laser Target Designator
- Description
- A beam-type weapon, long familiar to science fiction fans, became a reality after the invention of lasers. That reality differed from fictional “ray guns” however. Rather than destroy a target directly, a solder used this battery-operated, portable laser to illuminate a selected target. A missile or other munition equipped with a special sensor detected the reflected light then homed-in on, and destroyed, the target.
- This model AN/PAQ-1 laser target designator was developed at Hughes Aircraft Company following Theodore Maiman's creation of the first successful laser in May 1960. Before donating the laser to the museum in 1987, the U.S. Army removed a classified component so the laser will no longer function.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1984
- maker
- Hughes Aircraft Company
- ID Number
- 1987.0026.01
- accession number
- 1987.0026
- catalog number
- 1987.0026.01
- model number
- AN/PAQ-1
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
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Experimental cesium laser component
- Description
- In 1957 Columbia University physicist Charles Townes discussed recent maser developments with Gordon Gould, a Ph.D. student at the University. Inspired by the conversation, Gould wrote down thoughts and ideas for lasers and had the pages of his notebook notarized. Recognizing the commercial potential of lasers, Gould left Columbia and pursued laser research at TRG, a defense company founded in 1953.
- Though he lost the race to make the first working laser, Gould did make several lasers using cesium in 1961. This is the cesium light source for one of the early lasers based on his designs. The extent to which Gould’s notarized ideas were his own ignited fierce debate and patent litigation that lasted into the 1990s. The result of the litigation was that Gould’s patents, based on his 1957 notebook entries, were upheld.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1961
- maker
- Gould, Gordon
- ID Number
- EM.330385
- catalog number
- 330385
- accession number
- 288761
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History
