Where there's smoke...

I originally wanted to focus this post on smoke signals.  We've all heard of them, from LoonyToons to old westerns, but I thought, "What else can I learn about them?"  Well, as it turns out, not much.

For some Native Americans (and Boy scouts in modern times) smoke signals often followed a general pattern (although different tribes used different signals):
One puff =Attention,
Two puffs = All's well,
and Three puffs = Danger/Help (Indians.org, 2012)

This, surprisingly, was about the extent of information most sources had on smoke signaling, so I realized that I probably couldn't write an entire post on smoke signals alone, but my mind was still lingering in that area of thought.  Where does smoke come from?  Fire.  And fire, too, has been used for communication for centuries.  Now my field had expanded, to places I did not previously consider.

Throughout history, fire has been not only useful, but invaluable to mankind.  Although I could go into countless ways it's been beneficial, the focus of this blog, is, of course, communication, and fire has indeed been used as a reliable tool for communication.  If you've ever seen the Lord of the Rings movies, there's a scene in which one of the characters climbs a tower to light a beacon and call for aid before a battle.  In fact, while searching "Beacons", this reference dominated the top search results.  But war related uses do seem to be the most common for this method of communication.

Most Americans would recognize the line "One if by land, and two if by sea;" (Longfellow, 1861) from a famous poem about Paul Revere's midnight ride.  The line speaks of a signaling from a church tower to warn of the British army's advancement.  Beacon messaging has been used by such cultures as the Chinese in communication across the legendary Great Wall of China for centuries.  They would use smoke during the day and fire at night to relay messages about enemy troops, or attacks. (Chinese Heritage Quarterly, 2011)
Lighthouses are also a type of beacon, used to directs ships to safety, and guide them through treacherous waters, or to a harbor.

While my original concept of a beacon was limited to the use of fire, as I researched I realized that such communication is indeed still relevant today, but instead of using fire, we now use electricity.  At night, in fog, or rain, when driving a vehicle, we signal to other cars that we're on the road, using headlights, and taillights (which are useful in both day and night for communicating that we're applying brakes).  It is also common for drivers to make use of the high beam lights to different things in different contexts.
A flash may mean: "Police car ahead", "You go first", or "Your headlights aren't on"

I could go on about all the ways people use electric lights to communicate, but instead I encourage the reader to take a moment to consider the methods in which they personally employ these contemporary beacons each day.

References:

Longfellow, H.W. (1861). Paul Revere's Ride. The Atlantic Monthly. Retrieved from 
http://poetry.eserver.org/paul-revere.html

China Heritage Quarterly. (2011, July 14). Wolf smoke signals war. Retrieved from http://www.chinaheritagequarterly.org/articles.php?searchterm=006_wolf.inc

Indians.org. (2012). Smoke signals. Retrieved from http://www.indians.org/articles/smoke-signals.html