Popular Science Monthly 



369 



A Convenient Step for Automobiles 



THE running board of an automobile 

 is not an easy step for many 

 people, especially women and children. 

 To make the boarding of the car easier 

 a folding step has been put upon the 

 market by an Indiana inventor. 



The step is mounted under the run- 

 ning board and is operated by com- 

 pressed air. The driver of the car 

 simply presses upon a pedal when the 

 step is required, and it lowers itself. 

 W^hen folded into place it is entirely out 

 of sight and is so constructed that there 

 is no rattling. It adds but small weight 

 to the car. 



A similar step has also been perfected 

 by the inventor for railway trains. 

 \\'hen opening the vestibule door of a 

 car at a station, the porter simply pulls 

 a lever and the step drops into place. 

 This saves the handling of the wooden 

 step usually carried on Pullman cars. 



Pull Yourself out of the Mud 



THAT perpetual horror to the motor- 

 ist of sliding down a bank into a 

 ditch at such an angle that he cannot get 

 out under his own power is banished to 

 a fairly comfortable distance by a com- 

 pact block and tackle arrangement so 

 easily operated that it can be used with- 

 out danger of soiling the clothes. The 

 apparatus consists of a hand crank, pul- 



Turning the crank exerts stvenly times as much power 



as the force apphed, so that the car is easily dragged 



out of the ditch or up an embankment 



An automatic step lowered by pressure on 

 a pedal. By its aid a small child may 

 board the car with no great difficulty 



leys, steel cable and chain. One of the 

 chains is fastened to the three stakes 

 driven in the ground. The other chain 

 is attached to the framework of the auto- 

 mobile. The pulleys and wire cable are 

 in the middle. Turning the crank exerts 

 a leverage of great power — actually 

 seventy times as great as the force ap- 

 plied — so that little difficulty is experi- 

 enced in dragging even a 

 large motor out of a deep rut 

 or ditch back into the road- 

 way. 



An Owl Darkens the Town 



ON a recent evening a 

 large horned owl 

 jjlunged the town of Van 

 I>uren. Ark., into darkness 

 when it alighted upon a steel 

 tower and caused a short 

 circuit of the main feed 

 wire which supplied the 

 town with electricity. The 

 bird, which measured five 

 feet across the wings, was 

 killed by a current strong 

 enough to kill a horse. The 

 lighting company secured 

 the body of the dead bird, 

 and put it on exhibition. 



