THE MIAMI HERALD SUNDAY MAGAZINE April 8, 1956; section G A TRIP TO THE MOON by Dixie Gilliland Herald Staff Writer IF VACATIONERS of the next 50 years or so jam up Miami Interplanetary Spaceport trying to get passage on a rocket to the moon, they may have to thank in small measure a slight, goateed newcomer to the city. He is Jacque Fresco, a consulting psychologist who has spent many of his 40 years delving into the problems of the weird world of the future. Fresco arrived in Miami from Los Angeles bearing photographs of rocket models he made for use in several science-fiction movies. Three of his models are pictured on this page in his version of a trip to the moon in the year 2006. For interspace travel, the psychologist-inventor leans to the popular conception of a rocket ship. And he has drawn up a saucer-like space station using power generated by the sun, which Fresco believes is as possible as the man-made satellite scheduled to be launched next year in Florida. The space station he visualizes would be a sort of atmospheric filling station, holding large drums of fuel, "probably atomic fuel." Space ships would be drawn to the stations by magnetism, he says. In the airtight stations, life would be only a little more complicated than on earth. He does see a gravity problem, but thinks electro-static shoes are the solution. Food problems would be relatively simple if the world comes to his...[damaged original]...predicts tissue cultivation of meat and vegetables within 50 years. * * *
Earthbound World Will Change Too IN THE EARTHBOUND world of 2006, he foresees flying arrowheads, elevators that move horizontally as well as vertically and cars that need no drivers. Fresco sees no reason not to expect an entire new electronic world within the next 50 years. "After all, we never expected to see atomic energy in our time," he suggests. He pictures an America of tomorrow connected by cross-country canals which will solve irrigation, flood control, and transportation problems. His city of the future features functional centers with buildings radiating out from a circular main structure. He envisions elevators that run underground from building to building, then up and down to various levels. Automobiles he sees as teardrop shapes topped with transparent plastic which automatically turns dark in the glare of sunlight. A photo-electric effect, similar to the negative process, makes possible the color change. Fresco's cars would have proximity control, making collisions impossible but allowing the door to slide open and the seat to swing out to meet the driver when he approaches. A button worn by the motorist sends out a signal which sets the door mechanics into action, Fresco explains. Claiming already to have perfected invention for wing de-icing, Fresco expects the same principle to eliminate the need for windshield wipers. His theory is a probe which reaches out to measure the electrical charge in a raindrop or snowflake and automatically sets the wing or windshield to take the same charge. [damaged original]...he says, would be...[damaged original]...never strike the object thus protected. Fresco pictures a turbo-jet helicopter which incorporates the plane body with the propeller blades for more speed. While the whole copter rotates, the pilot sits stationary in a central control chamber on wheels. * * *
He Moved Here To Escape Smog FRESCO MOVED to Miami with his wife and 3 year-old son about seven months ago "to escape Los Angeles smog." For the past seven years he had operated his Scientific Research Laboratories in Los Angeles. It was there that he built his models of the world of tomorrow. He also worked as a movie technical adviser during the time. A Los Angeles concern is perfecting his invention of stereoptican photographs which do not require glasses, he says. Claiming a doctor's degree in psychology from Sierra State University of Los Angeles, Fresco was a corporal with the Air Force design development at Wright field for 18 months during World War II. He became interested in electronics while conducting psychological and physiological studies of vision and working of the human mind, he says. |