Its interesting to read post WWII accounts of the early amateur telescope making hobby. There was a fear there would be a second glass famine in WWII so a somewhat massive cottage industry sprung up to make optics which indirectly led to easily available supplies and ability to make homemade amateur telescopes. Which led directly to "The Amateur Scientist" column in the old Scientific American Magazine. And that column led indirectly to magazine columns like "Computer Recreations".

I had only read the WWII and post WWII coverage so it was interesting to read the linked article about the original WWI glass famine.

In a strange way, overtaxing window glass in the UK in the 1800s indirectly resulted in me implementing a Mandelbrot calculator on an 80s home computer based upon some interesting columns.