The Relativity Series: Circumstances Affecting the Heat of the Sun's Rays (Part 2)
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Willie Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He's not the finest character that ever lived, but he's a human being. So attention must be paid. You can stream the entire LA TheatreWorks catalog of plays. Find out more at streaming.latw.org.

This play is part of L.A. TheatreWorks' Relativity Series of science-themed plays. Lead funding for the Relativity Series is provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, bridging science and the arts in the modern world.

This is L.A. TheatreWorks. I'm Susan Loewenberg. Now, we continue with Circumstances Affecting the Heat of the Sun's Rays by Amanda Quaid, directed by Annalise Erickson, produced by L.A. TheatreWorks. ♪

You're keeping time. Yes, Mother. What, Mother? Not you, Mary. Gus keeps time. You go back to your Dickens as a... Gaskell. Why aren't we allowed to watch them up close? I'm superstitious it can alter the results. That new factory they built over there sure puffs out a lot of smoke.

What's it make? Textiles. It's big. It's good for the economy. Your father's thrilled. In this novel, a lady dies because she inhales too much smoke from a factory. Can that really happen? Not unless she lived on its roof. You read too many novels, Mary. I'm serious. It's not good for you. Time! Oh,

Both the exhausted jar and the compressed jar rose in temperature the same amount, 8 degrees. So, regardless of how much air is in there, we can say the jars warm at the same rate in the shade. Noted. Now I'll set them in the sun. Timekeeper? Go. You're sure we can't watch?

It's air in a jar, Gus. I think it's thrilling. I'll let them alone. We'll get through this round, but we'll have to wait until tomorrow to repeat. Your father's coming home soon, and you girls will have to supervise dinner. Where was he all afternoon? With Judge Cravens, who's trying to convince him to work for the godforsaken patent office. He must have enjoyed that, pattering on about his patents to somebody who's interested for a change. He can tell him about all the ones that were mine, like my fruit-drying rack.

Remember that? Who could forget? Was that the summer all we ate were peaches? Dried peaches, dried plums, rutabaga, leeks. I never dried leeks. Yes, you did. Well, it worked. And he said, patent it, Eunice. Don't keep it to yourself. I told him it works fine as it is. It's enough I have it. But...

He was anxious someone would see it. Maybe the milkman would peek in and get a glimpse and patent it himself. A patent is protection. And finally, the ultimatum, if I wouldn't, he would. So I said, sure, go ahead. And now, somewhere in the bowels of the patent office is Elisha Foote's fruit dryer improvement system. Who makes them? No one ever made one. Not a single one. It was just a silly thing I did.

But I've no doubt half the patents out there are the inventions of women. Men just love seeing their names stamped all over everything. But isn't publication a kind of patent? Like these journals? It's quite different.

You publish to start the ball rolling on a chain reaction. I did this. I found this out. Now you take it and do more. All science is climbing up on the shoulders of the man who came before so you can see just a little further than he could. Then someone climbs on yours, and on it goes. Publication is generous. Patents are... Oh, I'll hold my tongue. Time!

And the jars say... What? The compressed air is 20 degrees hotter. Huh! So the conclusion is sun makes the air hot? No, dummy. Mother's proven that the higher the air pressure, the more the sun heats it. That's why.

That's why it's colder at the top of a mountain where the air is thin. It's called a breakthrough, Mary. Mother's had a breakthrough. She's just proven something nobody has proven before. To my knowledge. Are you going to publish it, Mama? They don't publish women, Gus. Not yet. I don't know. I need to repeat it and see. In any case, it's nearly time for lunch. Mary, do you mind telling Lucy what we want and giving her some help? Yes, Mother.

Well, I'd say this is rather promising. What's the plan for tomorrow? Tomorrow we'll test again. Repeat the same experiment and confirm the results. Then we can go further. See what effect the sun has on other types of air. What other types of air? Well, damp air, for example, like the air down by the lake. Then we'll add more elements, gases, carbon dioxide. See if that changes the rate of temperature rise. And look!

The jars are cooling quickly out of the sun. Very quickly. Well, note that, too. Which object did you end up choosing, by the way? Object? For your art project. You borrowed my lens. Oh, yes. A crab shell. Oh?

Mmm.

And since then, I've drawn other crabs. The water, that whole world down there. It's very inspiring. Oh, they've cooled to their original temperature. How much time was that? Uh, two minutes, 15 seconds. Perfect. ♪

I think it's time to talk about Mary's plans. My brother's making a name for himself in Washington. Political circles. He's invited Mary down to stay with him and the family, introduce them to society. Once she's done with school... Nab her a husband? It's what she wants. He invited Gus, too, for the summer. You know, it might be good for them to get a taste of society. I'm not sending Gus down to Washington to suck up to senators' wives. I'm not sending Gus down to Washington to suck up to senators' wives.

Marry, maybe. Not for Gus. Because? She's plain. Don't be cruel. It's not opinion. It's a fact. Women need to be objective about these things. Gus will marry a professor or a doctor. Or a judge. She's not for Washington society. It doesn't suit her anyway. She'd fade into the wainscoting.

Did you want me to keep time? Yes, thank you. Carbon dioxide in the sun today, is that right? I'm setting it up now. May I watch? What's the time? 3.02. Start the clock, please.

We found common air oxygen gets hotter in the sun, 10 degrees. Compressed air and damp air also get hotter, but they both get hotter on their own in the shade, too. How much does common air rise in the shade? Hardly any at all. One degree sometimes, but barely. So that means... That means the sun's rays have a bigger impact on common air. It doesn't rise in the shade, but it rises 10 degrees in the sun. That's a big difference.

Even though compressed air and damp air also rise a lot in the sun, they rise quite a bit in the shade. So the rise in the sun is actually less significant. I see.

So, you're measuring how much the sun impacts the heat of different kinds of air. Right. What we're looking for is which type of air has the biggest discrepancy between shade and sun, and how quickly it rises. In that jar now is carbon dioxide. Yesterday we measured it in the shade, and now we're trying it in the sun. How much did it rise in the shade? Only five degrees, not much at all. So, depends...

Depending on how much the carbon dioxide heats up now, that'll tell you how reactive it is to the sun. You've got it. You know, I once met a geologist who told me there used to be more carbon dioxide in the air. I don't remember how or why, but I remember that. Much more carbon dioxide. When? Oh, now.

Millions of years ago, when dinosaurs roamed, he said, long before human beings arrived. What's the time? A few more seconds. I never knew that, that there was more carbon dioxide when dinosaurs were here. Is that why they went extinct? I don't know why they went extinct, actually. Do you? Just one of those things, wasn't it? Aren't species going extinct all the time? Time!

Thirty degrees. Thirty? In the shade it was only five. What does that mean? That carbon dioxide is extremely reactive to the sun. The sun's rays have a huge impact on it. It gets hot quickly. Quickly and intensely. Ouch! Want a hand? No. How's your experiment coming, Papa?

Alright. I collected data all last week. Before work. After work. Squeezing it in, eh? I set one thermometer in the shade and the other in the sun. I figure the difference tells me the exact heat of the sun's rays. Are the sun's rays hotter when the air itself is hot, is the question. Simple, really, but I could be onto something. Nothing like this, though.

You're saying carbon dioxide heats up that much more than oxygen. And it's only due to the sun's rays. And apparently cools more slowly as well. Look at this, Gus. It's the same temperature it was when we took it out of the sun. The others dropped right away? Immediately. Has that been shown before? Not to my knowledge. Well...

That's tremendous. It could be useful to meteorologists, weather prognosticators. What would it take to get a housewife published in the American Journal of Science and Arts? Depends on whose house she wives, I suppose.

I sometimes think I'm a sort of prognosticator. Oh? You see how that smokestack down there rises a bit and then goes flat? I've noticed it does that right before it rains. The sun is out. It's not always, but often enough. Often enough. Well, there goes the sun. I guess we'll retest tomorrow. Well done, prognosticator. Gus, close those windows, would you? I'll batten down my study.

You should publish it, Mama. Of course I should. But you won't? Unfortunately, it's not up to me. And you know I hate that. But I promise you, I'll try. Hello, Mary! Did you get caught in it? Oh, hello. Hello, Mother. What's wrong with you? You don't know. I'm afraid I don't. It was Mother Daughter's Day at school.

Oh. You forgot. What's Mother Daughter Day? It's an annual thing for the older girls. This was to be my first time, but you missed it. I'm sorry, Mary. I told you about it last week. I tried to find you this morning to remind you, but you were nowhere to be found. I was walking. Walking, yes. I know. All the other girls' mothers showed up, met teachers, watched some classes. Nothing momentous, just a really special day, you know?

I said you were sick. I couldn't bear to say that you'd forgotten. It was too humiliating. Anyhow, I suppose I'll go get changed. Eunice! Excuse me. What's she doing? I guess Father needed her. No, I mean, here. What's she doing here? Scientific research. But she's not making money.

Sorry if that sounds rude, but it's true. She refuses to patent anything, and she's not trying to become a professor, so... I mean, what exactly is she trying to do? She's trying to find things out. She just needs time. Truly, Mary, I think she could be like Isaac Newton or Galileo. Isaac Newton? Galileo? Listen to yourself. She made a big discovery today. You know what Isaac Newton found?

Gravity. You know what Galileo learned? The Earth's not flat. They had commissions from nobility to do their work. This? This is a hobby, Gus. And frankly, I'm surprised you don't resent it as much as I do. What did Papa want? He was reminding me about his lunch with the head of the patent office tomorrow. I guess I need reminders sometimes. Ugh.

She'll be all right. I know. Children always bounce back. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to write up the day's findings. Yes. And Mama? Hmm? I had a wonderful time today. Me too. Now, off with you. Please.

He's looking for a judge to consult on patent law, with the possibility of it becoming a full-time position down the line. But would you leave law? I never rule anything out. Was it just the two of you at lunch? No. It was Charles, Judge Cravens, and our old friend from school, Joseph Henry. Joseph's a professor of mathematics at Albany, but he's also an inventor. In any case, Joseph asked what I'd been working on lately, and I told him about my little experiment to measure the heat of the sun's rays. He said,

He was fascinated. Well, it turns out he has sway with the American Journal of Science and Arts. Oh, really? And he thinks I should have my experiment published. Just like that?

Just like that? Just like that. He knows you're not a scientist, right? I'm a man of many talents, as you know, and he knows. At school, I won prizes in chemistry, Latin, composition, technology, and oratory. Well, never first prize in oratory. That belonged to Joseph, which he doesn't let me forget to this day. Have you even properly finished your experiment? Not yet, but at the end of my findings, he simply told me to write...

The subject is unfinished, but it is my intention to return to it on some future occasion. Many authors do that, apparently. Well, what fun. Why, Eunice...

You're squirming. I am not. Your cheeks are hot. You can't stand it. Why is my husband, the dilettante, being asked to publish his half-baked hypothesis? Something like that? Something like that. Well, I also told him about yours, as it happens. And he asked a lot of questions. You know, your methods, your timeline. Yes. And... And...

Our papers will be published side by side in the next American Journal of Science and Arts. Mine will be published? As part of your experiment? No. Your very own. And I made sure to tell him that there's to be no Mrs. Elijah Foote business either. Circumstances affecting the heat of the sun's rays by Eunice Foote. Full stop.

Darling. The first experiment published under a woman's name in the history of the journal. And to top it off, you'll be making a speech. A speech? At the convention. After I present my findings, they want you to tell yours. I am no Susan B. Anthony, Elisha. I absolutely cannot, under any circumstances, speak at the convention.

Remember the suffrage convention? They wanted me to speak. I wanted to speak. I took one step on that stage just for a rehearsal and I nearly fainted. It was mortifying. This is different. It's not political. Of course it's political. Look at me. Imagine me up there and then tell me it's not political. Come now. Elijah...

We'll do a lesson. Public speaking needn't scare you. Is this from your salad days as a prize-winning orator? There's only one thing you need to know to speak well. You've got to ground yourself. It starts in your feet. Feel your heels make contact with the floor. My heels are nowhere near the floor, darling. Take off your shoes. I can't speak barefoot. Try to feel your heels then, however you can. I can't. Foot. All right.

unlock your knees release your belly I'm wearing this you idiot release your belly you try releasing your belly in a corset it feels like this okay fine I'm glad you're not presiding over my trial the way you fail to see the obvious fine fine speak from down here this is your power Eunice speak from here try you startled me try it

Release your neck. Don't push your head forward. Can't hear you. There it is. What was that now? Now your speech. My name is Eunice Foote. Excellent. I am here today to speak about circumstances affecting the heat in

Of the sun's rays. Oh, I'm getting dizzy. That's because you're breathing more. I don't think that's it. I can't feel my hands. My legs are... Would you like some water? Please, just stop talking. If I make a speech, then it's all about me. If it's good, I'm a show. If I choke, I'm a failure. I just want people to hear it. Hearing the words is more important than seeing me. To me...

For now. Don't you want to be recognized? Of course I want to be recognized. I want to have my name on buildings. I've never admitted that to anyone. Never dared to. It sounds so foolish. I want to have my name engraved over the entrance to Yale College. Is that too much to ask? For years, I've had this dream. I see the letters. How deep the etching goes. The size of it. And...

Freshman students far in the future, in the year 1997, will arrive for the first day of class and they'll get out of their carriages, tie up their horses, look up and say, who is Eunice Foote? And some upperclassmen will stare at them aghast and say, who is Eunice Foote?

"'Who is Eunice Foote? "'Oh, you've got a lot to learn at Yale, young man. "'Clap him on the back. "'You've got a lot to learn if you don't know who Eunice Foote is. "'This is my deepest fantasy. "'I quiver when I think of it. "'Sometimes it keeps me up at night.' "'Then speak.' "'They won't hear it if they see me. "'Can you argue that?'

Ask Joseph Henry to read on my behalf. As you wish. Eunice Foote! Our story continues next time. I'm Susan Loewenberg, producing director of L.A. TheatreWorks.