A Man of Science and Engineering in Troubled Times Wandering in the Late Qing Dynasty

When Li Yu arrived, an American teacher invited by Xie Yuxi was teaching a class on citizenship.

This kind of class is very popular in China now, because the imperial system has just been abolished, and everyone still doesn’t quite understand what a republic is, what a citizen is, how to be a citizen, and even some basic theories are not fully understood.

Not only are there lessons in schools, there are also many newspaper articles that talk about citizenship and the Republic.

Anyway, it is one of the hottest spots right now.

The material used by American teachers is a book by Judson, President of the University of Chicago, called "The American Citizen Reader".

This book has a great influence in the United States and has played a great role in shaping American society.

The entire book is about patriotism and freedom.

Very American, putting freedom before democracy.

Just the opposite of Europe.

However, during the Republic of China, there were still a considerable number of people who stayed in Europe, and their views were different from those who stayed in the United States.

The largest number of students are studying in Japan, which is different from those returning from Europe and the United States.

Anyway, the Republic of China was a melting pot, with people holding all kinds of views and ideas.

It is said that heroes emerge from troubled times, and the Republic of China was also considered a troubled time to a certain extent, and it encountered such big changes in culture, so a lot of great masters emerged.

In addition, the American teacher also talked about the "Parliamentary Law" that is often taught in American universities, which is to teach students how to chair meetings, how to discuss, how to vote, etc.

This set of things was very popular during the Republic of China. After all, there were many rallies, and it was also the "initial step for civil rights" advocated by Mr. Sun.

This teacher is very responsible for teaching work, and Xie Yuxi must have carefully selected him.

Her lectures are very rich in content. She also talks about how to write in English, and even talks about how to write an outline and how to outline it; how to expand an article into an article, and how to condense an article into an outline, etc.

It is much better than simply "refining the central idea" in elementary school.

They are all real things, not only useful for English composition, but also for Chinese composition, so the students are very serious.

But in Li Yu's opinion, it didn't matter, because later generations began to put composition as a top priority since middle school.

The fact that the students are so serious is because the vernacular is not yet popular in China, so they find it novel.

——In fact, if a scholar with a deep foundation saw it, he would definitely not take it seriously, because they are all the basic skills of eight-legged essay...

But in any case, we have entered a new era, and teaching in this way will help students support vernacular Chinese in the future.

The American teacher's lectures are generally smooth, but the classroom interaction is still a bit lacking. Different from Western traditions, Eastern students from China, Japan and South Korea have never had the habit of asking questions in public. American teachers can only point out questions and answers.

After they finished, they arrived at Li Yu's class. Today Li Yu took them to a new class that had not been taught in Tsinghua University before the festival - hand-made radio!

Tsinghua University has always had manual classes, and Li Yu directly integrated them into electronics.

Li Yu has always wanted to cultivate radio talents and teach this craft to more people. The benefits should not be too great.

And as long as you know the principles, rubbing radios by hand is not as difficult as imagined, and it's also fun.

In the early years of the Republic of China, there were not as many advanced tools as later generations, let alone integrated circuits. The circuit substrate for hand-rubbed radios was a wooden board, and then the ancient process of air three-dimensional scaffolding welding was used.

——It is estimated that no one knows what these original words mean.

Simple understanding: You can directly think of later generations of chips or integrated circuits as magnified countless times, so big that any capacitor or resistor is as big as a firecracker.

As for the process of hand-rubbing the radio, the first step is to rub the circuit board by hand.

Various components such as capacitors and resistors are quite old, and transformers even require hand-wound coils.

Plan the layout a little on the board, and then use the ink fountain to flick the lines.

If he hadn't traveled a hundred years ago, Li Yu would never have used this tool, which is only used on construction sites in later generations, to make high-tech products like circuit boards.

Well, there may be many people who don’t know what an ink fountain thread is... It actually means pulling out a thread from the ink cartridge, with ink on the thread. After straightening it, pick it up and then let go, and the ink thread will pop up in a straight line on the board. .

Before Li Yu traveled through time, this thing was probably only used on construction sites.

But now it's no big deal to rub the radio on a wooden board and flick the string with an ink fountain.

The most amazing thing is the wire drill used for drilling holes in wooden boards. By rotating the wire, the drill tip drills a hole in the wooden board.

——The carpentry emperor Zhu Youxiao exclaimed that he is an expert! I really want to play!

Then fix the ceramic seat of the electron tube on the hole, and then fix the choke coil, filter resistor, etc.

After arranging the components, the second step is to connect them.

The wires used for connection are quite historical, and the outer covering is still made of cotton fabric dipped in wax for insulation.

If you don't have the conditions for a soldering iron, you can only use double-layer terminals, wrap the wires and clamp them with pliers. This step is quite a test of skill, and a little carelessness can lead to poor contact, especially the more complicated power supply part.

The final step to the circuit board is to install the tuning coil and variable capacitor.

After doing this, set up a small wooden board in front of the wooden base and install the FM dial and knob.

Fortunately, I bought a ready-made multimeter (this thing has been around for a long time) to test the voltage.

The final step in the overall process is to install a few tubes.

By the way, in order to increase the volume, a large gramophone speaker is also added.

After finishing the whole set, it really looks a bit "cyberpunk".

After preheating for half an hour, you can turn it on.

It took a long time to rub the radio by hand, and it was not completed until the afternoon even with instructions.

Fortunately, Li Yu was so proud that he took up the afternoon class and the teacher didn't say anything. Those old gentlemen even came over to take a look, but unfortunately they couldn't understand. Especially after seeing Li Yu using a wire drill, a tool owned by the carpenter emperor Zhu Youxiao, they all shook their heads: "Absurd and ridiculous! You don't understand science." History? I wonder why the Ming Dynasty didn’t exist?”

Li Yu didn't pay attention to them. Even if he did, he could push them back by saying "Why didn't the Qing Dynasty disappear?"

At this time, almost the entire school gathered around the laboratory to see what Li Yu and a group of students were doing.

After the warm-up was completed, Li Yu called Tang Guoan in another experimental building: "Principal, start speaking."

Immediately afterwards, Tang Guoan's voice came out from the large speaker next to the radio:

"This is Tsinghua University. My name is Tang Guoan. Hello! Let me tell you about the last monthly exam..."

Well, the first radio broadcast in China and even Asia appeared in the form of campus radio.

Although it is very primitive and crude, it is just a small step on the radio, but...                            cough cough, cross the channel.

The onlookers cheered immediately after hearing the sound.

"It's incredible!"

"Is this amazing science?"

Li Yu came to the campus holding the radio again. He was farther away from the radio station and could still hear it clearly.

Hou Debang asked: "How far can the signal be received?"

Li Yu said: "It depends on the transmitting radio station. The low-power radio station used this time has a limited coverage range, up to dozens of kilometers."

Provost Zhou Yichun has been watching and said in surprise: "Doesn't that already cover the entire city of Beijing?"

Considering that the current Beijing city is indeed not that big, Li Yu said: "It can be understood this way."

The more everyone looked at it, the more delighted they became, and they all wanted to assemble it themselves.

In the following days, this "hand-made radio" class was held many times. Li Yu guided batch after batch of students to assemble many radio stations by themselves.

With this hands-on assembly experience, your understanding of radio principles will definitely be profound.

Moreover, this kind of class is not even available in the United States, and Li Yu is basically the first.

Li Yu is also preparing to write a teaching plan and promote it to all universities across the country.

I guess when Japan invades, the scene of finding radio stations in spy movies will no longer need to be staged, because they are everywhere...

Let the little devils have a deeper understanding of what is called the ocean of people's war.

Don’t you, little Japanese, like to engage in intelligence and investigate various details of China? Now under the gaze of tens of thousands of Payne's Samsara Eyes whose eyes and ears are connected to each other, you will have no secrets.

Intelligence is the first step in war. Damn you, I told you to engage in aggression, and you will all die here when you come!

Not only did he give lectures himself, Li Yu also invited Westinghouse, who had already come to China, to come to Tsinghua University for a class once a week, and then to the nearby Peiyang University for a class.

The Department of Telecommunications of Beiyang University (Tianjin University) is the predecessor of Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications in the future and cannot be underestimated.

After the incident was reported in newspapers, it quickly spread throughout the country.

Shenbao excitedly published: "Radio is a technology that foreigners are proud of. Now students in our schools can even make wireless telegraph machines. I can't imagine that in ten years, we will be able to keep pace with foreigners." !”

As a teacher, Li Yu was also highly praised by Tsinghua President Zhou Yichun.

He praised: "Li Yu is not a good teacher for those who are lazy to think, because these people just want to take notes and then memorize them to cope with the exam. Li Yu is not good at speaking in class, but If you want to know how to present physical ideas honestly and profoundly, how to see clearly the pitfalls and problems in reflection, and how to master the application of physics, then you will find that Li Yu is a first-rate teacher. Because of all this Everything is reflected in his lectures, he will make the audience think together, do things together, and touch the true meaning of physics together!”

Even Prime Minister Tang Shaoyi came to observe it personally and even tried it. Although he failed, he already felt that this thing could be done.

Tang Shaoyi said: "I have told people many times that although our country has never studied science, the brains of our people are not weaker than those of the people in Europe and the West. They are just unwilling to use their heart and do not know how to do it. Now with you, our The path of science will definitely become broader and broader!”

(Taixi means extreme west, which is similar to the term Far East. However, in modern society, the West has the right to speak, and terms such as "Far East" and "Middle East" centered on them have become mainstream)

Li Yu said: "Compared with chemical industry, transportation and other industries, the investment in radio technology is not that large, but the benefits are huge. In terms of cost performance, it is worth vigorously developing."

Radio classes have been set up in Beiyang before. Tang Shaoyi said: "I am going to arrange for the Ministry of Communications to establish a post and telecommunications school and an advanced radio class as soon as possible, and to set up wireless transmitters in the capital."

Historically, these will not be established until next year, and earlier is of course better. Li Yu said: "If it involves any technical issues, I and my company will provide help."

Tang Shaoyi said frankly: "Without you, it wouldn't be possible."

At present, radio in various countries is in its infancy. Due to power limitations, it is not possible to build a large-scale radio broadcasting station for the time being. It will take at least four or five years before there is a significant improvement.

Li Yu promoted radio mainly in schools to accumulate talents first.

Li Yu said: "Li Zhongtang of the former Qing Dynasty said more than ten years ago that communications, transportation, and finance are important tools of the country and cannot be easily left to foreigners. The communications industry is huge. Without government support, I, a scholar, cannot It’s very fruitful.”

Tang Shaoyi sighed and said: "It's a pity that I have to resign, otherwise I will continue to help you."

Li Yu wondered: "Resign? Why?"

Tang Shaoyi smiled helplessly: "Dirty things in the political arena."

From Tang Shaoyi's subsequent narrative, Li Yu learned the whole story.

Tang Shaoyi's cabinet and President Yuan Shikai had differences over the candidate for the governor of Zhili.

Logically speaking, this was the power of the cabinet, but Yuan Shikai was unwilling to follow Tang Shaoyi's opinion and hand over the position of governor of Zhili to the candidate proposed by the Tongmenghui. Instead, he forcibly bypassed the cabinet and appointed Feng Guozhang of Beiyang.

Although Tang Shaoyi had always been Yuan Shikai's absolute confidant in the past, he now agreed more with the Tongmenghui's practices and joined the Tongmenghui.

And out of public interest, Tang Shaoyi also stood on the standpoint of the Tongmenghui, expressed strong dissatisfaction with Yuan Shikai's violation of the temporary agreement, and resigned angrily.

Yuan Shikai didn't want to stay at all. He had already discovered that Tang Shaoyi was not under his control, so it was better to establish an obedient cabinet prime minister.

——Still not departing from the feudal dynasty practice of establishing a puppet emperor and then "coercing the emperor to order the princes".

The rebellion among Yuan Shikai's core team slowly began with Tang Shaoyi's departure.

After Tang Shaoyi resigned, it immediately triggered a chain reaction. Education Minister Cai Yuanpei immediately said that he would also resign.

As the most practical department during the entire Republic of China, Cai Yuanpei's resignation had a considerable impact.

Not long ago, the Ministry of Education just held an interim education meeting and passed the phonetic alphabet proposal, which are those strange symbols similar to radicals that you see in dictionaries.

Unfortunately, with Cai Yuanpei's resignation, this matter will be shelved for another year.

Of course Yuan Shikai knew the great role of the Ministry of Education, and Yuan Shikai showed special concern for a department like the Ministry of Education that had no significant influence on the center of power but was very useful at the same time. He did not want Cai Yuanpei to resign.

When bidding farewell to Yuan Shikai, Yuan Shikai tried to persuade him: "On behalf of the [-] million people, I will stay forever!"

Cai Yuanpei said: "Yuanpei also resigned as a representative of [-] million people!"

He showed no mercy to Yuan Shikai.

Before leaving Beijing, Cai Yuanpei paid a special visit to Li Yu, "Sir, he is a man who truly understands science. I have always understood the importance of radio and communications. After the founding of the Republic of China, Chinese people had already cut off their braids, but if they wanted to reach the heights of foreigners, they still had to do it." I need you to build the pillars of the country one by one."

Cai Yuanpei must have read Li Yu's speech.

Li Yu smiled: "Shucai feels the heavy responsibility."

In the eyes of everyone at present, the two words science and democracy are extremely noble words, and they are the elixir to save the Chinese nation and restore its glory.

But in fact, a hundred years later, technology has become unprecedentedly advanced, and people with low heads have suddenly appeared again. Technology seems to have become an invisible braid that restrains people.