City of Light: The Story of Fiber Optics

280 NOTES TO PAGES 13–17
6. Daniel Colladon, ‘‘On the reflections of a ray of light inside a parabolic liquid
stream,’’ Comptes Rendus 15, (Oct. 24, 1842), pp. 800–802, translated by Julian
A. Carey, Apr. 1, 1995.
7. René Sigrist, cites an unpublished manuscript by Pierre Speziali; (personal
communication, Oct. 10, 1995), Colladon’s Comptes Rendus paper cites a London
demonstration but does not say who conducted it.
8. Colladon cited experiments by Joseph Plateau, who steered light around
curves in a different way. See Joseph Plateau, ‘‘On a curious consequence of the
laws of light’s reflection,’’ Bulletins de l’Academie Royale des Sciences et Belles Lettres
de Bruxelles IX 2d, Partie (1842), pp. 10–14, read July 4, 1842, translated by
Jean-Louis Trudel.
9. A device he invented to measure polarization, called a Babinet Compensator,
is still widely used by optical specialists. Dictionary of Scientific Biography (Vol. I,
‘‘Jacques Babinet,’’ pp. 357–358).
10. Jacques Babinet, ‘‘Note on the transmission of light by sinuous canals,’’
Comptes Rendus #15, (Oct. 24, 1842) p. 802, translated by Julian A. Carey, Apr.
1, 1995; also Kaye Weedon, unpublished manuscript.
11. T. K. Derry and Trevor I. Williams, A Short History of Technology: From the
Earliest Times to A.D. 1900 (Dover, New York, 1993 (reprint of 1960 edition),
pp. 84–85).
12. Specimen in Corning Glass Museum.
13. The colors of the rainbow come from a combination of two effects: total
internal reflection and differences in the refractive index of water with wavelength.
Light rays that enter a water droplet are reflected back around the sphere,
emerging back toward the sun (which is why we see the rainbow when the sun
is behind us). Water refracts different wavelengths at different angles, so the
angle at which the light rays emerge depends on their wavelength, creating the
rainbow.
14. René Sigrist, personal communications, Oct. 10, 1995, and Nov. 13,
1995, citing Pierre Speziali, ‘‘La physique,’’ in Jacques Trembley, ed., Les Savants
Genevois dans l’Europe intellectuelle (Journal de Geneva, Geneva, 1987, p. 154).
15. David E. Nye, Electrifying America: Social Meanings of New Technology (MIT
Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1990); see chap. 2, ‘‘The Great White Way.’’
16. Gösta M. Bergman, Lighting in the Theatre (Rowman and Littlefield, Totowa,
N.J.; and Almqvist & Wiskell International, Stockholm, 1977, pp. 278–280).
17. ‘‘Preparations for the holding of the international health exposition,’’ Nature,
Feb. 21, 1884, pp. 388–389; Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee, eds., Dictionary
of National Biography: Vol. 22 Supplement (Oxford University Press, London,
pp. 230–231).
18. Bolton was not a specialist in optics, and the importance of total internal
reflection may have eluded him. It definitely eluded the writers of contemporary
accounts, and it takes careful analysis of published drawings to deduce how the
fountains guided light. ‘‘Illumination of fountains by the electric light,’’ Scientific
American Supplement #847, p. 7774 (May 2, 1885).
19. ‘‘The fountains at the health exhibition,’’ The Illustrated London News, Aug.
2, 1884, p. 106.
20. ‘‘Health Exhibition-X: the electrically illuminated fountain,’’ The Electrician
13, pp. 456–457 (Sept. 27, 1884); ‘‘The illuminated fountains at the Healtheries,’’
Nature, Nov. 6, 1884, pp. 11–12.
21. D. Colladon, ‘‘La Fontaine Colladon,’’ La Nature, 2nd half year 1884,