British Pathe

Newmarket, Suffolk.

L/S of launching of a guided missile at night. Camera pans as the missile flies up - great shot! M/S of a scientist in his laboratory. " In every scientific field man performs what might once have been termed, 'miracles'. Yet one single development - the transistor - has...

Newmarket, Suffolk.

L/S of launching of a guided missile at night. Camera pans as the missile flies up - great shot! M/S of a scientist in his laboratory. " In every scientific field man performs what might once have been termed, 'miracles'. Yet one single development - the transistor - has made many of these feats possible." M/S of a man in white coat working in the laboratory. C/U shot of 'seed' (crystal) growing machine. M/S of a man placing grown crystal into crystal cutting machine. C/U shot of the crystal wafer being cut. Voiceover explains the newest technology used to cut it - ultrasonic drilling. M/S of the man while taking crystal 'wafer' out of machine. C/U shot of the wafer in the man's hand. He cleans it and places it with other wafers. Several C/U shots of wafers cut and uncut.

In the next stage, wafers are sorted into separate piles according to their thickness. M/S of a girl sorting the wafers using a very thin water colour paintbrush. She measures them on a little electronic scale and sorts them accordingly. Several shots demonstrating the operation. Sorted crystals are fused under heat with indium to form an alloy. After unloading, the transistors are being assembled. M/S of a girl working. C/U shot of the girl's hands as she welds the alloyed metal on the three wires (base of the transistor). M/S of a girl using microscope. C/U shot of the girl's face while using it. C/U shot of the girl's hands using tweezers to place two tiny wires into centre of the alloyed metal. Transistor is ready to be tested. M/S of the women testing transistors. C/U shot of the hands wearing rubber gloves testing transistor. C/U shot of the oscilloscope's hand moving - transistor woks.

C/U shot of a 'huge' old time valve placed next to a tiny transistor. C/U shot of an old time radio next to the new, considerably smaller, transistor radio. C/U shot of the huge three-valve unit. Camera pans to show the same unit next to a box of matches - unit is slightly bigger. C/U shot of transistor placed next to a sixpence - coin looks huge.