Wonder of the Worlds
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to the Daily News and went past a freight door and a long line of delivery wagons that several men were loading with bags of Newspapers, and on up to the building’s main entrance. “Feel that,” Hall said, pointing down to the sidewalk.
He was talking about the vibrations coming from the steam printing presses inside. “That’s gold,” he said. “Yes, their gold, not ours,” I said. “For the time being,” he said.
We went inside and took the elevator up to the publisher’s office. Victor Lawson had already gone home for the day, but his secretary was still there. He said he would be glad to show us their Linotype set-up. The three of us went back down the elevator to the composing room. When we entered their shop, forty or fifty Linotypes were working away, mak- ing a clattering racket that would wear out a rabbit’s ear drums. I thought of the elegant, cat-like purr of Paige’s machine, and a warm, cozy feeling came over me, the sort of feeling a spinster has, I suppose, when she hears the caterwauling of her sister’s nine children. Hall and I approached one of the Linotypes. An operator was working at its keyboard, his fingers f lying with great expertise. At the end of each word he would hit a little space bar lever on the left side of the keyboard. With every stroke he made on a key, a brass matrix would slide out of the distributor and down through the inside of the magazine with a loud whish and plunk. The wheels and their belts whizzed and whirled, clicked and clattered. Mechanical arms would lift, drop with a snap, and lift again. A line of brass matrix slugs— negative molds of letters—slid along a little track like prisoners lining up for a firing squad. When a line of brass slugs would be completed, a little mechani- cal finger would push forward and squeeze the slugs together, giving the line a crude and inartistic justification. A pause. Then the line of brass matrix slugs would suddenly be fired upon with a sizzling spray of molten lead. Another pause. The solid but not-cooled lead slug would then be moved away by another mechanical finger. I looked down through the tangle of mechanical arms and pulleys and studied the molten lead sizzling and bubbling in its pot. I said, “That little crucible pot in the machine there for melting the lead— seems like a dangerous device. You ever have any problems with it?” “Well, not really,” the publisher’s secretary said. “No?”
“Well… once in a while, if the operator doesn’t put enough brass matrices in a line, the molten lead will be ejected through the gaps and out of the machine. When that happens it scalds and burns the operator. We call it ‘the squirt.’” “’The squirt?’”
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The publisher’s secretary nodded, and said, “The operator has to watch out for that.” “Yes,” I said, “I suppose he would want to avoid that.”
I walked around to the back of the machine, then came around to the front and looked at Hall. He was smiling. “Makes a lot of noise,” I said.
“Yes,” said the secretary, “but you get used to it. It’s very reliable. A real workhorse.” “How often do you have to shut her down for repairs?” I asked like a fool. “Repairs?” the secretary asked. “I mean, when it breaks down,” I said.
The secretary sort of smirked, but he was trying not to show it, for he knew all about our work with the Paige typesetter. The secretary said, “The Linotype doesn’t break down, not so far, at least. The operator checks it out after each run, and the mechanic shuts it down and opens it up for oiling once a month. But repairs? We figure by the time it breaks down, we will have profited from its use a thousand times over. It probably won’t be repaired when it breaks down, just discarded and replaced with another machine.” I felt like the secretary was making an idle boast. How little did I know that what he was speaking was about as close to the truth as a body could get. I said, “Well, that’s good. That’s all fine. I’m glad to see you’re happy.”
I had seen enough and told Hall so. We said goodbye to the publisher’s secretary and left. When we got to the lobby, I said, “We’ve got ‘em beat, Hall. That Linotype ain’t worth a damn. It’s got the squirts. And did you hear all the noise it made?” “Yes,” Hall said, “and I saw all the type that it was setting up.”
“Ah, that’s nothing. When Paige gets his machine up and running, it’s going to out-typeset the Linotype the same way the tortoise out-ran the hare. We’ve been slow getting started, but we’ve been running steady, and the finish line is in sight! I tell you, we’re going to run the Linotype people out of business!” “Maybe,” Hall said. “Let’s just take one thing at a time.”
“That’s what I like about you, Hall. You don’t get excited and you don’t get sidetracked—even when the facts are telling you everything’s a go. You just stay calm and cool even though you know you’re holding four aces! I tell you one thing—I’d never play poker with you!” We went on up to the lobby entrance. I opened the door and saw a young lady approaching from outside. She had blond hair and penetrating blue eyes. I pulled the door back and held it open for her to pass through. “Miss,” I said, tipping my derby.
The young lady nodded to me, looked away, and then jerked her head back suddenly to look at me again. I knew the look on her face, for I had seen
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it many times before. She had recognized me as “Mark Twain.” Usually this recognition was followed by some kind of praise, or request for advice, or my signature on their card, or—sometimes—a request for a loan, an investment in a business scheme, or an outright gift to them of a sum of money. I braced myself for just such a response from the young lady, but none came. She only looked at me, her eyes wide. She was thinking something—but what, I had no idea. It was only for a moment, but it seemed like a long time. Finally she said, “Thank you.” And she turned and went past me into the lobby.
Hall and I went on out to the sidewalk. I looked over at Hall and he raised his eyebrows twice and grinned. “Now, Hall,” I said, “you’re a married man.” “So are you,” Hall said. “Ha! I’m so married, I’m petrified.”
We went on our way down the sidewalk. It seemed a trivial incident, but it was not trivial. That young lady had recognized me—and her recognition would change everything for both her and me—very, very soon.
CHAPTER TWO
Bolt from the Blue
Idiots! They said it wouldn’t go; and they wanted to examine it, and spy around and get the secret out of me. But I beat them. Nobody knows what makes it move but me; and it’s a new power—a new power, and a thousand times the strongest in the earth!
— The Professor, Tom Sawyer Abroad
I was first introduced to Tesla at a dinner hosted by George Westinghouse about 1890, I believe, but I first heard of Tesla some few years earlier—around 1888—when I first saw his alternating current patents. I immediately recognized that these patents were the most important invention since the telephone. I would have invested in Tesla’s company then and there, but my finances were already heavily extended with the Paige typesetter. Soon after I saw Tesla’s patents they were purchased by Westinghouse and Tesla’s fame began to soar meteorically. To this day, I am not sure exactly how much Tesla made on the deal, but whatever amount the initial payment made to Tesla was, it was a mere bagatelle compared to the royal- ties that were promised to him. At the rate of $2.50 per horsepower of elec- tricity sold, Tesla was on his way to becoming the richest man on earth— literally. And, of course, that fact brought him to the attention of the few other richest men on earth. Do you think they wanted to welcome him to their club? Does a wildcat share its meat? I had read about Tesla and had heard about Tesla, but these preliminaries did not prepare me in the least for meeting Tesla himself. I have met just about every famous person in my time with the exceptions of Billy the Kid and Jessie James. On ref lection, perhaps I did meet Jessie once; at least I know I was
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robbed. Most of the famous people I have met have been a disappoint- ment. I have no doubt that I have been a disappointment to all of them, too. Famous people hardly ever live up to their advertising; they are nearly always a l
ittle less of everything that they are supposed to be. But Tesla was something more than his advertising made out, something more, per- haps, than advertising was able to express, something that there is no word for in the English language, nor in any other language in the world, I suppose. For this reason, as well as another, I have never attempted to write about Tesla for publication. I have literarily exploited the characters of a number of friends and relations who I have deemed unique and interesting, but not Tesla. You see, no one would believe Tesla; he is too much—too much of that something for which there is no name. The truth about Tesla was stranger than any fiction I could ever invent. Fiction deals in probabilities—while Tesla dealt—and deals—with improbabilities so far from ordinar y experience that—well—you would just get lost while you’re on your way tr ying to measure the distance. As for the other reason I have never written about Tesla: he is verboten. As of 1903, Tesla has ceased to exist as a public person by decree of J.P. Morgan. Actually and precisely, Morgan did not decree that Tesla had ceased to exist; Morgan decreed that Tesla never had existed. More than once over the years my friend Henry Rogers has advised me that it would be unwise for me to men- tion Tesla in any of my published writings. For these reasons, I have made no reference whatsoever to Tesla in any work of mine meant for publication, not even in my autobiography. Yet, I probably know Tesla as well as anyone.
Tesla himself is only amused by all of this. Fame and fortune have never been Tesla’s guiding stars; they have only been means to further ends; he has always aimed at Something Else. Knowledge? Yes, but knowledge applied to humanity, given to humanity, developed in humanity in order to transform humanity. Into what? Something more than it is—something more than it is now advertised to be—something more than a cow on its way to the slaughterhouse. Tesla’s aim has been something along these lines. But when man is free, what will man do then? I think Tesla has something in mind here, too, or he is in contact with someone or something that has something more in mind for man—the next step for our species. Then there are those others who want to keep us cows trotting down the chute to their own particular slaughterhouse… .
That night at the Westinghouse dinner I had just come through the door when Westinghouse took hold of my arm and said, “Clemens, he is here.” I turned in the direction that Westinghouse was pulling me and saw an extremely tall man surrounded by a group of women. I immediately knew it was Tesla. There was something about him that I would call “unearthly,” also something about him that I would call “earthly”. Those two qualities orbit 58
about him invisibly, charging his whole being with a kind of physical energy and high consciousness I have never encountered in another human (assuming for the sake of argument that Tesla is human). “It’s him,” I said.
“Yes,” Westinghouse said, “let’s see if I can pry him away from the ladies.” Westinghouse went up to the group and said, “Sorry, ladies, but I need Mr. Tesla. Can you get along without him for a moment?”
A strikingly beautiful woman said, “Only for a moment. Then you must release him. There is more to life than business.” “Only for a moment. Come along, Tesla,” Westinghouse said, dragging Tesla by his arm.
Then Tesla saw me. He had recognized me as “Mark Twain,” and I felt disappointed that he did not see me as I really was. But as he approached, the expression on Tesla’s face evolved from recognition, to awe, to a kind of smiling, boyish joy. He didn’t seem to be looking at “Mark Twain” anymore, but at Santa Claus. I had not expected this. I had expected a grave, intense thinking machine. But the Tesla I saw was a fantastically tall boy, and it was Christmas morning. “What happened to the frog?” Tesla asked, beaming. “The frog?” I asked, completely lost. “Yes. The frog! What ever became of him?”
I looked over at Westinghouse, hoping he could give me a clue. Westinghouse was giving me a grin that was all dollars and cents. Then it dawned on me. The frog. The damned frog. The dirty, damned frog of Calaveras County! The frog from that villainous backwoods sketch I had penned twenty-five years earlier when I was a callow youth destitute of wit and learning. I had vacillated on my estimation of the literary value of that frog story for years, and had finally settled on the public policy of acknowledging that, for its particular line, it was a good folk-tale. Privately and secretly, though, I knew the truth; it was only a fragment of something that might have been worthwhile, if effort had been applied to it. But when I wrote it, I applied no effort of any kind to it. It was only a f leeting thought, a f leeting after-thought, but a fleeting after-thought that had introduced me to the world as “Mark Twain” and that had, through the years, achieved a world-girdling fame. I could do only one thing with such a fortunate child of my imagination—pretend that I was proud of it. “The frog,” I said.
“Yes, yes, the frog,” Tesla said. “Dan’l Webster?” I asked.
Tesla bent double with laughter. He straightened, and said, “Dan’l Webster! What a name for a frog!” Tesla broke into laughter again. I looked back to Westinghouse. The dollars and cents were ringing up his bicuspids faster than ever. I looked back to
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Tesla. He was trying to compose himself. He was preparing himself. For a story. From me.
I thought: If Nikola Tesla wants to hear about that damned frog, I’ll tell him about that damned frog. “The frog,” I said.
“Yes. The frog,” Tesla said, like a child waiting for a bedtime story.
“Well,” I started, “you know, Dan’l Webster belched out all that shot. And when he did, he looked around and looked around and he saw nobody was watching, except maybe one fellow in the corner, and he was drunk. So Dan’l Webster took a jump—and another, and that second jump put him out the door. And he just kept jumping all the way back to the swamp. When Jim Smiley came back and saw Dan’l gone, he lit out for the swamp, and Smiley slopped around down there for an hour or two trying to catch him, but Dan’l would always slip through his fingers. Finally Smiley gave up, and said, ‘Just look at him settin’ there all wise and satisfied and full of f lies. It’s clear—Dan’l Webster is educated now and won’t work for nobody exceptin’ hisself!” Tesla bent double again, letting out a high-pitched laugh. Westinghouse’s smile had rung up all the profits and was just beaming with the pay-off. I thought my little impromptu tale as devoid of wit as its predecessor, but I stood there, pretending to be satisfied.
Tesla straightened out and wiped a tear of laughter from his eye, then said, “When I was a boy, I was very sick. They said I was dying. I said to my father, ‘If you will let me be an engineer, perhaps I will get better.’ He said, ‘I will let you. You must get better.’ Then he set down a book he had brought me from the library. I picked it up. It had a picture of a frog on the cover. The picture made me smile. I opened the book. It was written in English. I liked to read English. I read about Jim Smiley and his jumping frog, Dan’l Webster, way out in the Wild West of America. I laughed. I didn’t feel so bad anymore. I got better.” “I—I never imagined. I never imagined that story could do… that.”
Tesla said, “You have sent joy throughout the world. May that joy, in its long journey, find its way home again to you.”
Nikola Tesla was born during a gigantic electrical storm on the stroke of midnight between July 9th and 10th in the year 1856 in the village of Smiljan, which was in the province of Lika, which was held by the Austro-Hungarian Empire as part of Croatia and Slovenia. The village of Smiljan was probably not much different than my boyhood home of Hannibal. Tesla’s father was a parish priest in the Serbian Orthodox Church and wanted his son to follow him in that profession. But Nikola had other ideas. At the age of five Tesla invented a bladeless waterwheel. At the age of nine he invented a motor powered by sixteen June bugs. By contrast and compari- son, at the age of nine, I was squashing June bugs with my big toe. If I use
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myself as a measuring rod to get at the size of Tesla, you can see that if I am two fathoms, then Tesla is twenty thousand leagues.