Trying to find a documentary on technology

[seb phillips]

Hi folks,

 

please excuse a history teacher on the scrounge for resources:

 

In the past I've used a documentary on the way that technology effected WW1 - I think it was called 'White Heat' and I think it was part of the BBC Timewatch series - but it's very old and I'm not having a lot of luck tracking this down. If anyone knew of it that would be very helpful.

 

Also - I'm trying to write a lessons which links WW1 with the development of different things, such as radio, the tank, medicine etc. If anyone knew of useful resources in this area, it would be very welcome. I have some but  well, on THIS forum people always have much betetr ideas!

 

Regards,

 

Seb   

[WhiteStarLine]

Hi Seb,

 

Try the free download of the 1918 book "INVENTIONS OF THE GREAT WAR BY A. RUSSELL BOND MANAGING EDITOR OF "SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN,"

 

The index alone will keep you going for days and covers most of the themes you need.  The text is very readable once you get over his style:

 

"Three great inventions controlled the character of the fighting and made it different from any other the world has ever seen. These three inventions were American. The submarine was our invention; it carried the war into the sea. The airplane was an American invention ; it carried the war into the sky. We invented the machine gun ; it drove the war into the ground.

It is not my purpose to boast of American genius ...."

 

The illustrations are superb.

 

For your class, you will obviously need to distinguish between an original WW1 invention like the tank and the adaptation of existing civilian technology like planes and wireless into the very sophisticated equipment they became.

 

The book doesn't mention a significant weapon conceived and demonstrated in the last few days of WW1, later known as the 'bazooka', successfully developed by Goddard and fired 5 days before Armistice.  Goddard's wartime work on rocketry was funded in 1917 when he published he could get 40 kg into space.  The WW2 V2 rocket benefited from his research and experimentation.

 

Advances in surgical techniques and the administration of anaesthetic (to allow surgeons to do multiple operations in a row without been affected themselves) are worth mentioning but the illustrations that accompany these are not for the squeamish.

 

 

 

[seb phillips]

Many thanks!

That's why I love this board :-) 

[Nick Beale]

I read a John Terraine book long ago, "White Heat: The New Warfare, 1914-18" (Sidgwick & Jackson, 1982) but I don't recall the TV documentary.

[Skipman]

Might it be this one The War Revolution if not there's a list of Timewatch Documentaries here Click

 

Mike