Aircraft detection before radar - video and photo

[Jon]

It's always easy to over-anthropomorphize, but that first US radar sure looks a lot like the various pre-radar listening devices - but for gathering radio waves instead of sound waves. AFAIK, most modern radar does not follow that huge-ears-with-a-head-in-the-middle design.

This is similar to how some early aircraft were designed to look and function like birds.