Academy of Science. 25 



ance which attaches to this subject in our own State, our attention is awakened 

 with redoubled interest. These carefully recorded observations in progress for 

 the two years past, have established beyond a doubt, the existence of a liberal 

 quantity of ozone in Kansas atmosphere. The universally healthful character of 

 the climate of the State, is so widely known a fact as to need no comment here. 

 And in addition to our almost absolute freedom from epidemic diseases of every 

 character, our State is just now attracting very general attention as a desirable 

 resort for consumptive patients. Sufferers unable to endure the rare atmosphere 

 of the higher regions of Colorado, now frequently find returning health by a pro- 

 tracted residence in Kansas. Has the ozone of our atmosphere any connection 

 with this fact ? is an inquiry not infrequently addressed me by interested physi- 

 cians from the East — to whom a satisfactory answer can be given only after long 

 study and extended observation. In view of all the interesting features of this 

 attractive theme, I can conceive of no more promising a subject of study than this 

 of the offices of the ozone of our atmosphere in health and disease. Such an 

 investigation may not, to be sure, either lighten our taxes or increase the value of 

 our farm products. But it will be the means of revealing to us more fully an 

 accurate knowledge of the wonderful resources with which nature has endowed 

 us as a State ; upon which, after all, rests the foundation stone of our material 

 prosperity. 



ON SOUND TRANSMISSION BY ELECTRICITY. 



By Prof. J. T. Lovewell, Washburn College, Topeka. 



Two years ago a Boston teacher of vocal culture astonished the world by exhib- 

 iting at Philadelphia an instrument by which a person, talking, singing or making 

 any sound at one extremity of an electric circuit, might have the same words and 

 tones faithfully reproduced at the other extremity. 



At that time few people knew that this subtle agent, electricity, could be em- 

 ployed in the transmission of sound, though this thing had been done many years 

 previously. 



In 1837, Prof. Chas. Grafton Page, for many years an Examiner in the Patent 

 Office, utilizing Prof. Henry's discoveries, succeeded in producing what he termed 

 "galvanic music." This phenomenon at once attracted the attention of scientific 

 men, and, among others, the French electrician, De la Rive, investigated the sub- 

 ject with great cai"e in 1843. Nothing came of these researches, except to add 

 another laboratory experiment illustrating the physical principles of electricity. 



In all these cases the sound transmitted was first produced by the vibrating 

 spring of an induction coil which opened and closed an electric circuit; and the 

 same tone was reproduced by an electro-magnet through which the interrupted cur- 

 rent passed, and whose vibrations corresponded with tliose of the spring of the 

 induction coil. 



There was, following this, more or less crude speculation on the possibilities of 

 transmission of sound by electricity, but nothing better than De la Rive's experi- 

 ments is recorded till 1861. At that time Philip Reiss, teacher of a school at 

 Friedrichsdorf, near Homberg, entered the field of investigation with the true 

 German spirit. His first telephone was made with a Ijeer barrel, the bung of which 



