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The ear phonautograph was a macabre instrument. It was built by Alexander Graham Bell and Clarence J. Blake in 1874, and used a surgically-removed human ear—a skull fragment, ear canal, ear drum, and ossicle bones—to visually “write” sound waves. It worked like this: the surgically-removed ear was first attached to the top bracket of the instrument by a bolt driven through the skull fragment. It was then tightened in place with a thumbscrew. When a user spoke into the mouthpiece, located behind

Ave amice, scribiti te salutant. Knowing how much you like science, technology, innovation, piña coladas and getting caught in the rain, yours truly would like to bring a pill to your attention. Not just any pill, mind you. Nay. A high tech pill. A radio pill. Oooooh. Shiny. Until it came out, that is. Sorry, sorry. One could argue that our story began with American humorist / columnist / actor Robert Charles Benchley. The earliest mention yours truly could find for Benchley’s With gun and

At the start of 2022, I joined Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation as a research assistant. Ingenium curators Dr. Tom Everrett (Communications) and Dr. David Pantalony (Physical Sciences and Medicine) invited me to write about a research project that I am currently affiliated with called Autonomous Adaptive Soundscape (AAS). The AAS is an intelligent bio-algorithmic system that selects therapeutic soundscapes to relax ICU patients, via application of machine learning and

Greetings, my reading friend, and welcome to another day for you and me in paradise. As you know, there are people on this Earth who leave it far too soon. The passing of such people is all the more regrettable as you and I can name a host of people the planet could very well do without. Especially now. Yours truly would like to discuss with you today of one of those people who leave our little blue marble far too early. John D’Alton Woodlock was apparently born in 1916, in Montréal, Québec. His

As a blind/low vision child, two things seemed just out of reach for Samantha Moore: history and art.

Greetings, my eager beaver reading friend, a welcome caused by the fact that I see a hand poking out of the ether. You have a question? Wunderbar! Is there a typo in the photographic reference that will kick off this issue of our wonderful blog / bulletin / thingee, you ask? The year 1878 was a little too early, you say. It was certainly early, but not too early. The truth was / is that one of the first telephone networks in Canada was established in Montréal, Québec, in 1878, I think. I kid you

Artifacts from a Lindsay, Ontario job shop give us a glimpse into what a day in the life of this family-run print shop may have been like.

How do you create a virtual web-based museum exhibition for visitors with vision impairments? Read about the recommendations and inclusive solutions Carla Ayukawa, a curatorial studies student, learned through her consultations with the visitor group.

As the 2020-2021 Garth Wilson Fellow, Victoria Hawco provided design input on an international database of acoustical objects with Ingenium – Canada’s Museums of Science and Innovation.

Canadian Hugh Le Caine invented the 1948 Electronic Sackbut — the world's earliest known electronic synthesizer. Now a team at Ingenium is bringing this revolutionary instrument back to life.