What is "iconorama"

Iconorama was a Cold War electronic projection system for graphic presentation ("stylized display using an etched plate to produce symbols") ordered by the USAF in 1959.

The mechanism used a rear projection display, showing both a map overlay from a fixed lantern slide and dynamically updated data from a mechanical plotter. The mechanism for etching the slide is somewhat similar to an Etch A Sketch. The display can draw lines and characters, but cannot erase them individually. The unit was used in the IBM 473L Command and Control System's Large Panel Display Subsystem (e.g., at the National Military Command Center and the Alternate Military Command Center). Advertised in 1961 by Ling Temco Vought, the system used "a coated slide...one inch square" that was scribed "by a moving stylus" to make traces (e.g., for paths of attacking bombers). The unit was used in the Marine Technical Data System and at the Air Force Command Post, Mount Weather, Pacific Missile Range, Point Mugu Calif.; the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico; the Atlantic Missile Range at Cape Canaveral, Fla., and the Naval Research Laboratory. NORAD's Combined Operations Center at the Chidlaw Building and BMEWS Central Computer and Display Facility at Ent AFB used Iconorama, and in 1971 an Iconorama was still being used by NORAD for BMEWS.