INVENTED IN DALLAS by Evelyn Montgomery
Dallas is known for technological advances, present and past, such as the local invention of the car radio and the traffic light. While these are the type of inventions that were developed independently by several people in different places, all trying to solve the same practical problem, a Dallasite created them right here, and gave us a cultural bonus as well. I am plagiarizing the work of historian Steven Butler, who spoke at the recent 11th Annual Legacies Dallas History Conference in January on “Henry ‘Dad’ Garrett: The Wizard of Dallas, Texas.” Garrett was not an inventor by trade, he worked for the city, including running the fire department, and dabble in technology to solve the city’s problems. Early automobile traffic in Dallas was complicated at every intersection. The only possible signaling system were police officers directing traffic, sometimes with a sign on a stick that they would turn to show the “stop” side or the “go” side. There was no way to coordinate their efforts from one intersection to the next, and you can imagine the delays created. Garrett thought electricity might solve the problem, and his traffic light used the color system already found on railroad signals. The first lights were controlled manually by a policeman in a tower, an improvement for him over standing in the street amid angry drivers. The introduction of a timing system eliminated the need for human observation, though one wonders how much drivers trusted those first signals not to tell everybody to go at once. Garrett found a way to provide radios with power and antennae to solve a lifethreatening problem in the fire department. When the trucks were called out from the station for one fire, there was no way to let them know if another one started someplace else. Garrett’s radio allowed firefighters and police to maintain contact, but it was broadcast radio, over open airwaves. The need for a radio station to send the information led to the cultural bonus, when Garrett
started KERA. The station broadcast fire and police calls, as well as music
and local programming, all together. It was undoubtedly an interesting station
and listeners would have known what was going on around town. It would
seem that Dallas tends toward the practical in both technology and entertainment.