The First Commercial Laser
I've posted a bunch of pictures of old lasers here, but this one's unique. After Hughes announced the first operation of a pulsed ruby laser, Raytheon jumped right on it. First thing they did (after repeating Maiman's design) was to build some experimental devices using an elliptical pump cavity. Completed by November 1960, those laboratory prototype units were described and shown in one of my earlier threads linked here: http://www.photonlexicon.com/forums/...ing-Link-Laser
Commercialization was the next obvious step, and their model LH-1 was the result. The picture of it below is from "Electronic Progress" volume 6, #1, Jul/Aug 1961 (a Raytheon publication). Notice the iron sights on the top of the head! Laser alignment before He-Ne.
That is a very obscure publication, but I've only been able to find two other pictures of this laser in other places. First, showing just the head, is in this ad for EG&G flashlamps in "Electronics World" of December 1962. This may be a model LH-2 though (which was cooled by liquid nitrogen), because of the extension off the front end.
The other is a 1x1.5" picture in an ad for the Cleveland Institute of Electronics, in the back of "Electronics World" March 1968 (page 83), showing both head and power supply.
Can't imagine I'll ever find one of those lasers for my collection, but "never say never", right? In any case, I was told that one of them was donated to the Smithsonian by Raytheon in the late '60s or early '70s, so there IS hope that at least one of them has survived. I'm thinking about the final scene in "Raiders of the Lost Ark".
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