Mechanical Advertising Novelties from 1911 [Slide Show]
From Scientific American, September 30, 1911
![Mechanical Advertising Novelties from 1911 [Slide Show]](https://www.scientificamerican.com/sciam/cache/file/2C3621E5-DEAE-4CF0-83E3F732664EA654.jpg?w=590&h=393)
Mechanical Advertising Novelties from 1911 [Slide Show]
- Figure 1. THE BOTTLE THAT CANNOT BE EMPTIED
A recently patented apparatus, which has been quite successful as an advertising novelty, consists of a bottle suspended in an inclined position and from its mouth there pours a constant stream of liquid into a tank. As there is no visible means for replenishing the liquid in the bottle, one would naturally expect it soon to become empty, but the level of the liquid in the bottle remains the same. Nature's laws, however, have not been upset, for in the center of the stream is a glass tube of the same color as the liquid and, hence, invisible. A pump is constantly withdrawing liquid from a tank and forcing it up into the bottle, whence it pours out around the glass tube, thus rendering it invisible. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 2. A CLOCK WITH NO APPARENT DRIVING TRAIN
A clock, keeping excellent time and consisting of a plate of glass on which is painted a dial, a bolt passing through the center of the dial and forming an axis for hands, with no apparent place for a clock movement, will always attract much notice. Recently an ingenious jeweler in a West Virginia lumber town constructed one, using a pane of glass, and wood for the hands. Many a lumber jack spent hours conjecturing how it worked. In Fig. 2 the enlargements on the hands house the watch movements and the shifting counterweights. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 3. THE CONCEALED MAGNET CAUSES THE BALL TO ROLL AROUND BUT NEVER OFF THE BOX
Here is a clever apparatus for attracting attention. All that the spectator sees is a flat-topped box on which a large ball rolls round and round but never falls off. The force moving this sphere is invisible. The sphere is but a thin shell, and inside this shell is small metallic ball. Inside the box is a magnet which is rotated by a small motor. As the small ball endeavors to follow the magnet, it causes the large sphere to roll about the box lid. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 4. THE CHIMNEY SWEEP BEFORE AND AFTER IMMERSION
Our illustration shows a device for calling attention to the excellence of a certain brand of soap. This shows a very grimy figure descending from a chimney into a basin, from which he emerges clean and white. The two figures, however, are on separate endless belts driven by a hidden motor. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 5. THE CRESENT MOON SMOKES WITH THE AID OF A PUMP
Most people imagine that the wooden Indian has a monopoly on the tobacco business, but he has a competitor in this dummy which ostensibly smokes a cigar. The cigar, however, is likewise a dummy and the smoke comes from a concealed pot of burning tobacco and is intermittently expelled from the lips of the dummy by concealed bellows. One of the most elaborate of these signs, which was recently patented, is a hollow crescent figure, whose convex face is studded with incandescent lights, and bulbs are also arranged in the eyeholes and at the outer end of the cigar, held in the mouth of the figure. At the back of the figure is a box containing a small motor which operates a mechanism for intermittently turning on and off the lights, and blowing smoke out through the mouth of the figure. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 6. AN AUTOMATON THAT BLOWS SOAP BUBBLES
The blowing of soap bubbles is an occupation usually accorded to children, but an automaton for doing this has been patented. This figure dips his pipe in a bowl of soapsuds, then raises his arm and at the same time a current of air is turned on for blowing the bubble. The bellows and the mechanism for working the various levers and valves are located in the box on which the automaton stands. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 7. THE DECEPTIVE CUP OF STEAMING COFFEE
Nothing is quite so comforting to a hungry man on a cold day as the steaming dishes of food displayed in the windows of restaurants. A close examination of the dish would disclose a cleverly concealed steam pipe running from some distant boiler and discharging through the bottom of the dish like the coffee cup shown. Scientific American, September 30, 1911 - Figure 9. THE GLASS OF IMITATION CHAMPAGNE
Shows a display for effervescent wines. The stem of the wine glass is hollow and in the lower end is a porous plug, through which air is forced by a concealed pump. The pressure must be small in order that the air may rise in minute globules, thus imitating sparkling champagne. Scientific American, September 30, 1911
