Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
http://www.pgdp.net.
[Illustration: _Getting up the aerial was a blistering hot job._]
----
THE RADIO BOYS SERIES
(Trademark Registered)
THE RADIO BOYS AT OCEAN POINT
OR
THE MESSAGE THAT SAVED THE SHIP
BY
ALLEN CHAPMAN
AUTHOR OF
The Radio Boys' First Wireless
The Radio Boys at Mountain Pass
Ralph of the Roundhouse
Ralph the Train Despatcher, Etc.
WITH FOREWORD BY JACK BINNS
_ILLUSTRATED_
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
Made in the United States of America
----
*BOOKS FOR BOYS*
By Allen Chapman
12mo. Cloth. Illustrated.
*THE RADIO BOYS SERIES*
(Trademark Registered)
THE RADIO BOYS' FIRST WIRELESS
Or Winning the Ferberton Prize
THE RADIO BOYS AT OCEAN POINT
Or The Message that Saved the Ship
THE RADIO BOYS AT THE SENDING STATION
Or Making Good in the Wireless Room
THE RADIO BOYS AT MOUNTAIN PASS
Or The Midnight Call for Assistance
THE RADIO BOYS TRAILING A VOICE
Or Solving a Wireless Mystery
*THE RAILROAD SERIES*
RALPH OF THE ROUNDHOUSE
Or Bound to Become a Railroad Man
RALPH IN THE SWITCH TOWER
Or Clearing the Track
RALPH ON THE ENGINE
Or The Young Fireman of the Limited Mail
RALPH ON THE OVERLAND EXPRESS
Or The Trials and Triumphs of a Young Engineer
RALPH THE TRAIN DESPATCHER
Or The Mystery of the Pay Car
RALPH ON THE ARMY TRAIN
Or The Young Railroader's Most Daring Exploit
GROSSET & DUNLAP, Publishers, New York
----
Copyright, 1922, by GROSSET & DUNLAP
_The Radio Boys at Ocean Point_
Published June, 1922
----
FOREWORD
By Jack Binns
In these days of Radio broadcasting, when the country has gone wild over
wireless music and entertainment, there is a tendency to overlook the
other phases of radio--such as its use as a means of saving life at sea,
and for navigational purposes generally. There is no doubt about the
interesting character of broadcasting, and equally, there is no doubt
about the importance of radio as a means of life saving.
With this thought in mind, I think that the present volume, detailing
the adventures of the Radio Boys, serves a very useful purpose in that
it forcibly portrays the use of wireless to bring aid to a disabled ship
on the high seas in a storm.
By doing this it will inculcate a desire among boys to learn the
wireless code and transmit wireless telegraphy messages themselves, and
in doing so will tend to develop that nucleus of communication experts
in the coming generation, which is always an imperative necessity to
every nation.
----
CONTENTS
- CHAPTER I--TAKEN UNAWARES
- CHAPTER II--JUST IN TIME
- CHAPTER III--MARVELS OF RADIO
- CHAPTER IV--FACING THE BULLY
- CHAPTER V--A BIG ADVANCE
- CHAPTER VI--THE WONDERFUL TUBE
- CHAPTER VII--BASEBALL BY WIRELESS
- CHAPTER VIII--A THRILLING CLIMAX
- CHAPTER IX--THE LOOP
- CHAPTER X--OFF FOR THE SEA SHORE
- CHAPTER XI--A LONG SWIM
- CHAPTER XII--THE RADIO STATION
- CHAPTER XIII--EXCITING SPORTS
- CHAPTER XIV--FUN IN THE SURF
- CHAPTER XV--SKIMMING THE WAVES
- CHAPTER XVI--A THANKLESS RESCUE
- CHAPTER XVII--AN OCEAN BUCKBOARD
- CHAPTER XVIII--IN THE WIRELESS ROOM
- CHAPTER XIX--DANCING TO RADIO
- CHAPTER XX--THE RADIO CONCERT
- CHAPTER XXI--A DASTARDLY ATTACK
- CHAPTER XXII--IN THE GRIP OF THE STORM
- CHAPTER XXIII--FROM THE JAWS OF DEATH
- CHAPTER XXIV--A TERRIBLE PLIGHT
- CHAPTER XXV--THE FIGHT IN THE DARK
----
THE RADIO BOYS AT OCEAN POINT
CHAPTER I--TAKEN UNAWARES
"Jiminy, but this is hot work!" exclaimed Bob Layton, as he laid down
the hammer he was using and wiped his perspiring forehead.
"Hot is right," agreed his friend, Joe Atwood, as he also took a
moment's breathing space. "You might almost think it was August instead
of early June. Old Sol must have got mixed up in his calendar."
"I'd call it a day and knock off right now if we were doing anything
else," remarked Bob. "But, somehow, when I get going on this radio
business I can't seem to quit. There's something about this wireless
that grips a fellow. Work seems like play."
"Same here," said Joe. "I guess we're thirty-third degree radio fans all
right. I find myself talking radio, thinking radio, dreaming radio. If
there was any such thing as radio breakfast food I'd be eating it."
"I'm afraid we'll get thin if we wait for that," laughed Bob, picking up
his hammer and resuming work on the aerial that they were stringing on
the top of his father's barn. "But come along now, old scout, and get a
hustle on. We're going to finish this job to-day if it takes a leg."
Joe stretched himself lazily.
"I hope it won't come to that," he replied. "I need both legs in my
business."
"Well, come along and shake a leg anyway," counseled Bob. "I'm not
asking you to lose one."
"I'm glad we decided to make this aerial in umbrella shape," remarked
Joe, as, following his friend's example, he set busily to work. "I think
it has it all over the vertical one. We'll be able to hear the messages
from the broadcasting station a heap better than we ever did before."
"I'm sure we shall," returned Bob. "That's the kind Doctor Dale is using
on his set, and he tried both the vertical and the flat-top kind before
he finally settled on this. It's better for long-wave work. It stands to
reason that since it has the greatest surface area it also has the
greatest capacity. Then, too, the end of the antenna that has the
greatest potential is nearest the ground. The doctor gave me a lot of
dope about it that sounded reasonable. He knows by actual experience,
and that's better than all the theory in the world."
"What Doctor Dale says goes with me all right," replied Joe. "He's never
been wrong yet in any of the tips he's given us. It's funny, isn't it,"
he continued, as he deftly drove a nail, "that we're never satisfied
with what we've got in this radio work? That first set we put together
looked pretty good to us at the time. Then the ones with which we won
the Ferberton prizes looked a good deal better yet. But now here we are
making it still better."
"That's the beauty of radio," said Bob, with enthusiasm. "The surface of
it hasn't been more than scratched so far. It's practically a brand new
thing with a million features to be explored and countless improvements
to be made. I suppose a few years from now we'll be laughing at the
instruments we're using now. They'll seem as old fashioned as the stage
coach and the kerosene lamp. Some of the best brains in the world are
working at it now, and there's hardly a day that you don't hear of
something new in connection with it. It keeps you guessing all the time
as to what will turn up next."
"Right you are," agreed Joe. "Did you read the other day about that man
in Paris who runs his house by radio? You know they have a powerful
radio outfit on the Eiffel Tower. That starts operations at six o'clock
every morning. This fellow has rigged up things all over his house that
are controlled by the waves that come from the tower. First the shutters
fly open, then the curtains are drawn back, then electric heaters get
into action and begin to make the coffee----"
"Say," interrupted Bob, turning to look at his friend, "what are you
giving me? Trying to get me on a string?"
"Honest to goodness, I'm not trying to kid you," replied Joe. "This is
straight goods. The coffee begins to bubble in the percolator, the
breakfast is started cooking, and the people are waked up by electric
bells placed alongside their beds. If the weather is hot, the electric
fans are started working."
"Does it wash and dress the baby, too?" demanded Bob, with a laugh.
"I don't know whether they've got as far as that yet," replied Joe, with
a grin; "but it starts a lullaby at night and sings the baby to sleep.
It sure does wonders. There seems to be no limit to what it can be made
to do."
"We'll have to tell Jimmy about that," chuckled Bob. "Anything that will
save work will make a hit with him. He'll want to hitch it up so that it
will saw wood for him and mow the front lawn. By the way, Joe, when did
Jimmy say he'd be around? He promised to help us out with this."
"He said he wouldn't be able to get here before three," replied Joe. "He
had to go on an errand for his father. But to-day's baking day at his
house, and I smelled doughnuts cooking as I came past. Ten to one he's
filling up on those. That beats working on a roof in a hot sun."
"I shouldn't wonder if you were more than half right," agreed Bob. "But
what's keeping Herb? He promised to help out on the job."
"There's company at his house," explained Joe. "But he said he'd slip
away as soon as he could and get over here."
"Sounds mighty uncertain," said Bob. "Looks like a case of doing it
ourselves if we want it done. And it's got to be done this afternoon.
They've got a dandy program on at the broadcasting station to-night, and
I don't want to miss it."
The two boys set to work with redoubled energy, despite the sweat that
rolled down their faces and made them have frequent recourse to their
handkerchiefs.
"What's the idea of all those rocks down at the side of the barn, Bob?"
inquired Joe, at the moment that his work brought him close to the edge
of the roof.
"They're for some repairing that dad's going to do to the barn," replied
Bob. "The side of it has settled some, and he's going to put in a new
stone foundation. The old shebang needs a lot of fixing, anyway. The
water pipes are rusty, and they'll have to be replaced. He wants to get
the place in shape before we go down to Ocean Point for the summer."
"Ocean Point!" repeated Joe, with a sigh. "Why do you want to bring that
up now when I'm dripping with sweat? It's cruelty to animals. Say, Bob,
what would you give just at this minute to be taking a dip in the briny?
Just imagine yourself at the end of the pier with your hands above your
head, ready to dive down into that cool green water, down, down, down,
and feel it closing all around you and----"
"Who's cruel now?" groaned Bob. "Stop right where you are or I'll throw
something at you. Don't you suppose I'm just as crazy as you to get down
there? It's only last night that I dreamed I was there. Oh, boy! The
swimming, the fishing, the boating, the games on the sand, the----"
"Radio," suggested Joe.
"Righto!" agreed Bob. "That will be a new thing there that we've never
had before. And instead of being in a hot, stuffy room, we can sit on
the veranda, with the sea breeze blowing all around us, and the ocean
stretched before us in the moonlight, and the lights of ships passing up
and down the coast and----"
"Back up," laughed Joe. "You're getting poetical. You could almost set
that to music. But you're dead right that it will be just what the
doctor ordered to listen to a radio concert under such conditions. Where
can we put up our radio set? In your cottage or mine, I suppose."
"I've got an idea it would be a good thing to put it up in the community
hall," replied Bob. "Then everybody could enjoy it, and there's a
broader and bigger piazza there than any of the cottages have. We're all
like one big family there anyway."
"That's a dandy plan," agreed Joe. "I shouldn't wonder, too, if we
caught a good many messages from ships while we are down there. Almost
all the vessels now are equipped with wireless, and we ought to be able
to listen in on lots of talk going on with the shore."
"I only wish we could talk back to them," said Bob. "I'm keen for the
time when we can send messages, as well as listen in on them. But that
will be possible, too, before the end of the summer. I'm studying up
hard on the code and I know you are too, and we ought to be able to pass
our examinations soon and get the right to have a sending station. But
look who's going down the street, Joe!" he exclaimed, interrupting
himself suddenly.
Joe followed the direction of his glance and gave a grunt of disgust.
"Buck Looker and his bunch," he remarked contemptuously. "Carl Lutz and
Terry Mooney always trailing along with him! I wonder what low-down
thing they're cooking up now."
"No knowing," replied Bob carelessly. "They've steered pretty clear of
us since we got back that set of Jimmy's that they took. I have to laugh
whenever I think of them rolling over and over in the dark and fighting
each other when they thought they were fighting us."
Joe laughed too at the recollection.
"We put one over on them then all right," he agreed. "And I have to
laugh, too, when I think how he crawled yesterday when you called him
down in the school yard while he was bullying little Sam Ashton."
"I didn't want to soil my hands with him," returned Bob. "I'd made up my
mind never to speak to him again. But it made my blood boil when I saw
the way he was tormenting a boy half his size and I had to interfere."
"It did me good to see how he backed down," chuckled Joe. "I really
hoped he wouldn't, for I wanted to see him get a good trimming. But
Buck's memory is good, and I guess he remembered the thrashing you
handed him the night he was trying to wreck your aerial."
"Perhaps," laughed Bob. "I sure was sore at him that night and I guess I
gave him good and plenty."
"The pity of it was," said Joe, "that nobody was around to see you do
it. Ten to one he told his cronies afterward that it was he who licked
you. But there was no mistake yesterday. Lutz and Mooney were standing
close by and saw him take water. He turned fairly green with fright when
he saw you double up your fists. You want to keep your eyes open, Bob,
for he'll try to get even by doing you a dirty trick whenever he thinks
he can get away with it safely."
"Let him try," replied Bob indifferently. "That's the least of my
worries. What's bothering me a good deal more now is why Jimmy and Herb
haven't turned up to help us out on this job."
"Guess they've got stalled somewhere," hazarded Joe. "But even if they
don't turn up we'll be done in half an hour or so. Then it's me for a
cold bath and some dry clothes! I'm drenched to the skin."
A half hour later there was no sign of the truants, but the job was
done, and Bob and Joe ran their eyes over it with keen satisfaction.
"Some little mechanics, old scout!" chuckled Bob, slapping his friend on
the shoulder. "Now for that cold bath you were----"
He stopped suddenly and gave vent to an exclamation of surprise.
"What's the matter?" queried Joe, who was adjusting his belt.
"The ladder!" exclaimed Bob. "It's gone!"
Joe looked toward the edge of the roof, and saw that the top of the
ladder by which they had mounted was no longer in sight.
"It must have fallen down," he said; "but it's queer we didn't hear it."
"Fallen nothing!" snorted Bob, as he crawled to the edge of the roof and
looked over. "It was resting solidly against the roof when we left it,
for I shook it with my hand to make sure. Somebody has taken it down.
There it is lying on the ground, twenty feet away from the barn."
"Now we're in a nice fix!" exclaimed Joe, in dismay. "Have we got to
stay here all the afternoon and be baked to a frizzle by this scorching
sun? Call to somebody in the house, Bob."
"That's the worst of it," replied Bob lugubriously. "Mother's out
calling to-day and there isn't a soul at home."
The boys looked at each other, and the same thought came into the minds
of both.
"Buck Looker!" they exclaimed in one voice.
"That's who it was," declared Bob savagely. "He and his gang have done
this. If we could see him, it follows that he could see us, and he
thought he'd keep us up here broiling while he had the laugh on us. No
doubt the whole crowd are hiding somewhere and watching us at this
minute."
"Well, they're not going to make a show of us," Joe almost shouted in
his wrath. "I'm going to get down off this roof and I'm going to get
down quick, ladder or no ladder."
Before Bob could stop him he had grasped the water pipe that ran
alongside the barn and started to slide down.
"Don't! Don't!" cried Bob, in alarm. "The pipe's rusty! It'll break! For
the love of Pete----"
His voice ended almost in a scream.
For at that moment what he feared happened.
The pipe broke beneath Joe's weight. The lad felt it going and grabbed
frantically at the upper part that was still fastened to the roof. He
caught it and held on, his legs dangling in the air directly over the
pile of rocks more than twenty feet below. To fall on those rocks meant
broken limbs or death!