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"To go out on January day and run around on the beach under a golden sun makes a very great change in your outlook on the universe."
- Robert Silverberg
 |
| Skycar | ||
| A personal means of transportation that flies. |
As far as I know, this is the first use of this term.
| “Red Hades,” murmured the doctor. “I’ve always been afraid it would happen. I must get there quickly.” Twenty minutes later his private skycar, bearing the blazing-fire cross of the medical profession, was piercing the atmosphere at a thousand miles an hour, on its way to Los Angeles, where the mighty studios of World Teletainments, Inc., were situated. |
| Technovelgy from Prima Donna 1980,
by Bernard Brown. Published by Amazing Stories in 1931 Additional resources -
|
Another detail:
Robert Heinlein liked this term enough that he used it in his classic 1941 novel Methuselah's Children:
This term also appears in The Swordsman of Sarvon (1932) by Charles Cloukey:
Read more about the Camden speedster, the car referred to the above quote..
...it was well past five o’clock when Doctor Heiberg climbed into the tiny saloon of his private skycar and adjusted the pneumatic side grips.
Had there been a bystander, he would have been startled to observe what appeared to be a standard Camden rise up off the ground as easily as a skycar. He would not have long to wonder - the car moved out over the lake, dropped down to the water and sank beneath it. Seventeen minutes later, the car rose up to the surface of a small pool of water, a pool that occupied much of the floor of an artificial cavern.
The little skycar maintained its headlong rush for almost two hours. Then it circled down to land upon the wide ledge half-way up the cliff-side, the ledge upon which the cave opened.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Prima Donna 1980
More Ideas
and Technology by Bernard Brown
Tech news articles related to Prima Donna 1980
Tech news articles related to works by Bernard Brown
Skycar-related
news articles:
- Moller M400 SkyCar Taking Too Long
| Xiaomi Self-Driving Self-Balancing Scooter |
| AV-STEP To Permit Sale Of Vehicles Without Steering Wheels Or Pedals |
| 'Robovan' Name Already Taken - Elon, Try These |
| Tele-Driving Offers Jobs For Tele-Drivers, Not AIs |
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'Nemourlon armor of reasonable weight resists penetration by most fragments and any bullet that is not both reasonably heavy and fairly high-velocity.'
'Several thousand of them formed the positioning grid on the rubble pile.'
'Its slack walls tightened, bulged, were crossed by ripples and waves of movement.'
'Norman... had never ridden any motorized device that lacked onboard steering and balance systems.'
You will note that HG Wells also figured out the aspect ratio of the future!
'As though a switch had been turned off, the pain stopped...'
'At the ringside opposite them a table had been removed to make room for a large transparent plastic capsule on wheels.'
'... he realized that the moving thing inside was - of course - a robot.'
