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"It wasn't until I was past forty that it bacame clear that I was going to be quote, successful, unquote."
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Not the first use of contragravity (or contra-gravity), which has been around for quite a while; read on.
The word itself was used in physics as early as the nineteenth century. Here's a quote from The Autobiography of Eric Russel (1857):
The hyphenated phrase "contra-gravity" is used early on in science fiction. The Golden Age story Barton's Island, written in 1929 by Harl Vincent describes it:
The engine room of the Inquisitor was provided with
two contra-field generators, each of sufficient power
to support the vessel when fully loaded. These generators were of the most improved type, and were connected to fore and aft pole pieces from whence the
contra-gravity flux emanated. When these were energized, a field was produced that could be varied in intensity at will, as well as reversed if the necessity arose.
The basic discovery of the graviton had led Barton to the development of this unique apparatus, and the
zenith of perfection had been reached in this particular
portion of the Inquisitor's mechanism. The graviton,
be it remembered, was identified by Barton in the
laboratory as a close analogy to the magneton, that
final element of magnetism whose relation to magnetism
is similar to that of the electron to electricity. Its relation to the earth's gravity field being determined, it
was a logical, though by no means a simple, step to the
artificial generation of gravitons, both positive and
negative. The method of producing a negative gravitonic field surrounding two poles composed of the metal
bartonite was his final development, and the world
found itself in the possession of a practical means of
getting away from the surface of the earth by the repulsive force of the opposing fields.
Compare to the anti-gravity belt from Armageddon: 2419 A.D., by Philip Frances Nowlan. Comment/Join this discussion ( 0 ) | RSS/XML | Blog This | Additional
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