﻿REPORT ON THE CONSTRUCTION OF A VOWEL 



ORGAN 1 



By E. W. SCRIPTURE 



The attempt to construct an organ that could sing the vowels took 

 its rise in connection with work on curves of speech and experiments 

 in the production of artificial vowels. The Helmholtz theory that 

 the physiological action in the vowels consists in reinforcing over- 

 tones of the glottal vibration was rejected because it had been proved 

 to be incorrect by the results of analyses of vowel curves by Pro- 

 fessor Hermann of Konigsberg, and myself. Work was begun on 

 the Willis-Hermann theory, namely, that a vowel consists of a 

 resonance tone aroused by a series of sharp puffs from the glottis. 

 The action of the glottis in producing sharp puffs and not smooth 



vibrations was supposed to be similar 

 to that of striking musical reeds. The 

 reed portion of a vox humana pipe was 

 accordingly placed in connection with a 

 bellows. 



A previous investigation had made it 

 evident that a hitherto neglected factor 

 must be introduced into any vowel 

 theory, namely, the softness of the wall 

 of the resonator. A reed pipe will re- 

 spond only when the pipe cavity is har- 

 monic to the reed ; the vocal cavities 

 would respond only to overtones of the 

 glottal tone — if they were made of 

 metal. The walls of the cavities are, 

 however, soft and inelastic; it was 

 necessary, therefore, to imitate this property. Water resonators 

 were first used. To obtain spherical water resonators, wooden forms 

 were made into which wire netting was pressed ; the resulting series 

 of pairs of wire hemispheres were lined with absorbent cotton (figure 

 56). For use the resonators were dipped in water; the cotton had 



1 This is the first report submitted by Professor Scripture on the results of 

 his experiments on the subject indicated in the title. The researches were 

 conducted under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution, by the aid of a 

 grant from the Hodgkins Fund. 



360 



56. — Wire frame with 

 cotton for half of spherical 

 water resonator. 



