Did you know the global pictures (e.g. television, weather, news, etc.) that we take for granted as an everyday part of of modern life all got their start here in Marion? It began at a Collins Radio tracking station on the north edge of town near Lowe Park now called Echo Hill. There, in Aug. 1960, Collins engineers transmitted the first ever photograph by satellite to a sister facility in Richardson, TX. The achievement was the culmination of nearly ten years of effort that had begun with another experiment conducted from Collins' facilities at the Cedar Rapids airport in 1951 where engineers first demonstrated the feasibility of transmitting intelligible messages through space by bouncing a radio message off the moon.

Arthur Collins was a visionary; he looked into the future and saw that the key to achieving global radio communication lay in SPACE and not taller antennas and bigger transmitters. Through a decade of pioneering research he and his engineers showed that the moon, balloon-satellites and the ionosphere could used to relay messages across the globe. They were small but important steps toward building the world of global communications we have today and earned Collins Radio the opportunity to bring us the voice and pictures of every American astronaut since the beginning of the Space Age.

In 1960 NASA hatched a plan to launch a giant inflatable mylar balloon into orbit, 1000 miles high. The balloon would act as a mirror, passively reflecting radio signals back to Earth far beyond the range of antennas. The program was called Project Echo. On August 12, 1960 they launched Echo I. When fully inflated the balloon measured 100 ft. in diameter; it was easily visible at night almost everywhere on Earth as it circled the globe at 16,000 mph. Scientists were encouraged to develop their own experiments using Echo I to reflect telephone, radio and television signals, a challenge Collins was prepared for.

Collins engineers had constructed tracking facilities at Richardson, TX and on a hill in northern Marion near present-day Lowe Park, now called Echo Hill. There they built two 28-foot pivoting antenna dishes that could lock onto and follow the satellite as it sped overhead. A comparable system was constructed at Collins' facilities in Richardson, TX. On August 13, 1960, just one day after the Echo I launch, they bounced signals off the orbiting balloon and carried-on a two-way voice transmission via the satellite with the engineers in Richardson. A week later they used Echo I and a standard Associated Press (AP) wirephoto transmitter to send a photo of President Eisenhower from Marion to Richardson, TX, the first picture ever sent through space via satellite.

A larger balloon was launched in Jan. 1964, and Collins engineers repeated their experiments, but Echo II was the last of its kind. With the development of larger more powerful rockets, NASA quickly turned to active communication satellites, capable of receiving and rebroadcasting radio signals. The Echo satellites fell back to earth long ago, but Echo Hill remains, marking the site of a historic milestone in global communication by the engineers of Collins Radio. More about Project Echo and Collins' pioneering space engineers in The Collins Story: On the 50th Anniversary of the Moon Landing, coming to the Marion Heritage Center in July, in collaboration with the Arthur A. Collins Legacy Association. Next time: the Collins Radio Nov. 1951 airport "moon bounce" experiment and the important role a Marion lab tech played.

PHOTO CREDITS

Echo satellite photo from The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation by Jon Gertner.

Echo Hill satellite dish and Echo Hill control room from Collins Signal, November 4, 1960, courtesy of Collins Aerospace Museum.

Echo Hill Station courtesy of Collins Aerospace Museum

Collins tracking crew for Echo II: seated from front to rear: Floyd Perkins, Estel Darland, Frank Metecek. Standing: Clifford Deamer (foreground), Gerald Bergemann (rear). From the First 50 Years: A History of Collins Radio Company by Ken C. Barband

Eisenhower photo, as received in Richardson, TX, from the First 50 Years: A History of Collins Radio Company by Ken C. Barband. ... See MoreSee Less

4 days ago  ·  

On this day in history, April 12,1949, Collins Radio engineers operating from the Collins Feather Ridge Radio Observatory on Palo Road in NW Cedar Rapids conducted the first-ever observation of the moon by a radio telescope during a total lunar eclipse. Engineers observed that the lunar microwave temperature did not vary significantly from that in sunlight and concluded that the radiation came from below the surface and the moon was covered by a layer of dust sufficiently thick for the temperature to stay constant. The finding was reinforced by a second observation six months later.

Later in 1949-50 Collins engineers applied their microwave research to developing a solar radio sextant for the U.S. Navy. Regular sextants needed a clear view of the sun to determine an accurate position for a ship, but the radio sextant worked in any kind of weather. The engineers also developed an advanced model of the sextant that operated at night using the energy emitted by the moon. The Collins sextant has been called one of the most significant advances in the history of navigation before the development of GPS. . . another Collins achievement.

The presence of the moon's dust layer was confirmed in 1969 when some of those same Collins engineers arranged to send us the first television pictures from the moon on the Apollo 11 mission. They've brought us the voice, pictures and data of every American astronaut since the beginning of space travel.

Art Collins wasn't a huge space enthusiast--understanding radio waves and their many applications was his passion--but he had the vision to see "out of the box" and understand that the key to achieving global communication lay not in taller antennas or bigger transmitters, but in using space. He and his engineers experimented with utilizing the ionosphere, the moon, balloons, and eventually satellites to extend the reach of his radios, and in the process invented new methods of communicating and navigating, built some of our first radio telescopes and conducted pioneering space research, and developed the Distant Early Warning (DEW) system that guarded our northern frontier during the Cold War. The Collins Story: On the 50th Anniversary of the Moon Landing, coming to the Marion Heritage Center in July, in collaboration with the Arthur A. Collins Legacy Association. Next time: Marion's historic Echo Hill, site of another amazing Collins Radio space first.

photos show a time-lapse eclipse from Feather Ridge in 1954, the Feather Ridge Radio Observatory control room and the radio sextant, courtesy of the Collins Signal magazine and the Collins Aerospace Museum. ... See MoreSee Less

1 week ago  ·  

Following up on Tuesday's post about the unsung hero of Collins Radio, M. H. Collins, Arthur Collins' father, here are a few photos of the Collins Farms illustrating MH's organizational genius. His methods have been slammed and called "corporate" farming, but that label misses the point that incorporation was just an organizing convenience for MH and a way to raise capital, not a tax or legal dodge. His real aim was to apply the most up-to-date discoveries and technology in ag science and jumpstart an industry that had long been mired in tradition. Much like his son would, MH saw the future and leaped in with both feet! Only the worst drought and depression in U.S. history caused the farm co. to fail. Key features of the Collins operations:

No horses or horse-drawn machines on a Collins farm, just lightweight high-speed general purpose tractors pulling the latest in farm equipment: 2-row pickers, 4-row planters, combines, etc.

In the planting and harvesting seasons work went on 24-7 in 12-hour shifts. Tractors and other machinery had electric lights to work through the night.

Every Collins farm was located on a hard-surfaced road, making it easy to truck equipment between farms.

Equipment was serviced on a regular schedule by mechanics who operated out of portable machine shops that were transported by truck from farm to farm.

Large storage facilities and drying equipment allowed grain to be stored until markets were favorable.

Farm foremen lived with their families on the farm in company-owned houses. They were employed year-around. Most were ISU graduates. Casual workers were hired as needed. All the foremen and company executives spent two weeks in school in the off-season studying current farm problems and techniques.

More about MH Collins in The Collins Story: On the 50th Anniversary of the Moon Landing, coming to the Marion Heritage Center in July, in collaboration with the Arthur A. Collins Legacy Association. ... See MoreSee Less

3 weeks ago  ·