PHOTOGRAPHING THE UNSEEN: THE 

 ROENTGEN RAY 



H. J. W. DAM 



[By permission from McClure's Magazine, April, 1896, 

 copyright by S. S. McClure, Limited.] 



IN all the history of scientific discovery there 

 has never been, perhaps, so general, rapid, and 

 dramatic an effect wrought on the scientific 

 centres of Europe as, has followed, in the past 

 four weeks, upon an announcement made to the 

 Wiirzburg Physico-Medical Society, at their 

 December [1895] meeting, by Professor William 

 Konrad Rontgen, professor of physics at the 

 Royal University of Wiirzburg. The first news 

 which reached London was by telegraph from 

 Vienna to the effect that a Professor Rontgen, 

 until then the possessor of only a local fame in 

 the town mentioned, had discovered a new kind 

 of light, which penetrated and photographed 

 through everything. This news was received 

 with a mild interest, some amusement, and much 

 incredulity; and a week passed. Then, by mail 

 and telegraph, came daily clear indications of 

 the stir which the discovery was making in all 

 the great line of universities between Vienna and 

 Berlin. Then Ront gen's own report arrived, 

 so cool, so business-like, and so truly scientific in 

 character, that it left no doubt either of the 

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