Most forts here still had parrot guns on display until the war effort of 42 when they were given up for scrap ; and if memory serves me the edison telephone and the telgraph were used to relay messages between the signal tower and the gun enplacements as well as the flag man (in day time ) .......spam radio indeed ! I don't have it in front of me(but I will find it ) but it was the British engineers who first tested tested the different cannons against masonry ; and that is why fort builders turned to all concrete (1898) in their building structures .The forts ;the ones that stayed active into world war 2 have become time capsuals of what was the latest "Methods and Materials" of not only the 19th cent but the 20th as well . The concrete structures mostly all painted with asphaltic tar which I understand is a mortar and tar science in itself ; mostly to protect them from salt Py > . > > ************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com. -- To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to: <http://listserv.icors.org/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>