The Wilbur Smith Discussion Forums

In "Men of men" a gizmo called a Heliograph is being used. I had never heard of that before, and although I understood how it worked from the book, I searched the Internet and found this on Wikipedia.

Heliograph

The best part in that article is:

By the time the mirror instruments were retired in 1941, they were seldom used for signalling. Still, the army hated to see them go as "They made damn fine shaving mirrors."

Definitely a good way of doing it before the invention of the radio, can send information over long distances in a relatively short time. I can see how they made good shaving mirrors. These days the wing mirror on the landy is a good subsitute