by Sesh Heri
“Right now. As of right now you’re fired here. Now go on.”
With the help of A.K. Brown the Tesla Electric Company was formed and finally Tesla’s system of alternating current began to be developed and pat- ented. George Westinghouse went to see Tesla at his new laboratory and there they struck their famous deal. Now Tesla came into his own. Soon his childhood dream of taming the energy of Niagara Falls seemed within his reach when Westinghouse bid for the contract to build an electrical generating station atop the falls. And soon New York society discovered Tesla and the most exciting event of the season was a soiree at Tesla’s laboratory where the mysterious inventor would juggle balls of fire, hurl lightning bolts, and carry about from room to room glowing incandescent light bulbs attached to no wires whatsoever. And so I also came into Tesla’s orbit. From the Westinghouse dinner, I invited Tesla to the Players Club, where he became a member. There, Tesla, Joseph Jefferson, the actor famed for portraying Rip Van Winkle, and I began what was a little informal club of our own. We would meet at the Players or at Tesla’s laborator y and spend a night engaged in fantastic conversation. Once, late at night in his laboratory, Tesla looked out the window, gazing upon the dark buildings of lower Manhattan, and said: “Mark, someday soon the world shall be transformed. Today men toil by the sweat of their brows. They live short lives of suffering and ignorance. But tomorrow—ah, tomorrow. Things will be different.” “How?” I asked.
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“I cannot say just yet. But I will tell you t his. I have discovered something—something that goes beyond all my previous inventions by orders of magnitude. Its conception came to me all in an instant—as a bolt from the blue. It is a new power—a new power—and a thousand times the strongest in the earth.”
One night Joe Jefferson sent a note down to Tesla trying to coax him out of his laboratory and up to the Players Club, but Tesla sent back a note asking us to meet him at his laboratory at midnight. Joe and I took a cab to Tesla’s laboratory down near the tip of Manhattan. We got out of the cab and banged on the door. We could see a light on inside. After a minute, Tesla opened the door. “We’re here for the show you promised us!” I said. “Yes,” Joe chimed in, “We want a show!”
Tesla said, “You’ve come just in time. We have another member to add to our audience. Mr. Chauncey McGovern of Pearson’s Magazine.” “An Englishman!” I said. “I know McGovern. He’ll make a good audience. You’re sure to fetch him. Just be sure to throw in plenty of thunder. That’s what will impress him.” Tesla said, “Thunder’s good. Thunder’s impressive. But always remember, Mark, it is lightning that does the work.”
“Tesla!” I cried. “I wish I’d have said that! Can I steal it and put it in one of my books?” “It’s all yours, Mark,” Tesla said.
Tesla put on a show for us to beat anything I ever saw—juggling mysterious balls of fire that appeared out of nowhere in mid-air—bathing himself in a sheet of electricity and lightning bolts. Then Tesla set me up in one corner of his laboratory. He created one of those strange balls of fire and tossed it to me. I caught it in my hand and felt a tickling sensation, like a thousand ants crawling on my palm. “Throw it to Joe!” Tesla shouted.
I threw the ball and Joe caught it in his hands and let out a whoop. Then Joe threw the ball to McGovern who missed the catch. The ball of fire drifted to the f loor, bounced, f lew up in a corkscrew spiral—and dis- appeared in mid-air. “Yee-how!” I shouted. “Make another one!” Tesla snapped his fingers and another ball of fire appeared in his hand. McGovern said, “I’d like to see Kellar do that!”
Tesla threw McGovern the ball. McGovern caught it, and said, “It tickles! What is this?” “Ball lightning,” Tesla said.
“You mean—it’s really lightning?” McGovern asked. “How do you make it?”
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Tesla said, “It comes from the generator over there. Waves of electricity permeate the space around us. It only takes the proper trigger to condense the energy into a spinning ball.” “And what is the trigger?” McGovern asked.
“The snap of my fingers. The friction creates static electricity. This creates an asymmetry in the field which can then be shaped with the proper resonance.” “Resonance?”
“Everything in the physical universe is a manifestation of vibration and its frequency. If you know the correct frequency, you can attach your machines to the very wheelwork of nature and accomplish anything you can imagine.” “Anything?”
“Anything.”
“What’s this, Tesla?” I asked, looking at a strange platform.
“An experimental therapeutic device designed for use in hospitals. It still needs work.” “What does it do exactly?” McGovern asked.
“It promotes the healthy growth of muscle and bone tissue and aids the digestive and circulatory systems by slightly increasing the speed of blood flow without an increase in blood pressure.” “How does it do that?” McGovern asked. “Through vibration,” Tesla said. “Vibration again,” McGovern said. “Yes,” Tesla said, “vibration and frequency.”
Tesla f lipped a switch on the machine and the platform began to hum and vibrate over a rubber pad. “So you think this really works?” I asked. “Oh, it works,” Tesla said.
“Would it work on rheumatism and lumbago?” I asked. “Most definitely,” Tesla said. “Let me try it,” I said.
“I don’t think so,” Tesla said. “It is only in the experimental stages of development.” “I don’t care,” I said. “You said it works. It either works or it doesn’t. Which is it?” “All right, Mark. You can try it—but only for a few moments. When I give the word for you to get off, you must get off.” “I’ll get off, just let me get on first!” I stepped on the platform and suddenly every molecule in my body was vibrating. It was the most delightful sensation. It felt like every kink and tangle in my anatomy was being relaxed. After a few seconds, I almost felt like I was f loating. The pain in my left knee was gone, also the pain in my right elbow, which up until that moment I did not know I had, because I had become so
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used to it. With the pain gone, I felt free and alive. I felt like a boy again. I started whooping and waving my arms.
“All right, Mark,” Tesla said. “You’ve had enough now.” “Yee how!” I shouted. “I’m just getting started!” “You’d better believe me,” Tesla said, “it’s best that you come down now for your own good.”
I said, “You couldn’t entice me off of here with a jug full of whiskey—or pry me off with the lever of Archimedes!” The moment after I said that, I felt a sharp, grabbing pain in my abdomen. Something had backed up down there in my bowels and had locked up and was not going any further, even though it kept trying. I could hardly lift my foot up to step down off the platform. As soon as my feet hit solid ground, I knew I was in trouble. From my stomach down I was all urgency. “Quick, Tesla!” I groaned. “Where is it?”
Tesla took hold of my arm and guided me toward a door in the corner of the room. I shuff led across the f loor, stooped over and pigeon-toed. As we approached, Tesla’s assistant, Kolman Czito, rushed forward and opened the door. I realized by the concerned look on Czito’s face that this thing had happened before—probably to Czito, or to Tesla, or to both of them. I went through the door and Czito closed it. There before me gleamed mercifully the white porcelain seat of the toilet. A few minutes later, I returned to the laboratory with a look of peace and repose on my face.
I said to Tesla, “When you said it worked, you didn’t say what it worked!” “I warned you,” Tesla said.
“That you did. That you did. And next time I shall observe your warnings. I am one of those fools who always believe that experience is the best way to find out about anything. But anyway, at least I am thoroughly purged.” “Purged?” Joe Jefferson asked.
“Yes,” I said, “purged of everything that was in me, including all my sins.” “Oh, no! Not you!” Joe said.
“Yes,” I said, “I now know how those saints in the olden day
s felt when they swallowed the host and achieved sanctification as it passed down through their digestive tract. They were stercoranated. That’s what I am—stercoranated!” “I can’t believe that,” Joe said. “An old sinner like you can only release the sulphuric vapors of Hades! And what was that awful noise I heard in there? Vesuvius?” “Watch your mouth, Joe Jefferson, or I’ll learn you!” “Oh, you will?” “I’ll strap you on that vibrating torture rack of Tesla’s and let it shake you where the sun don’t shine! Then we’ll see who’s the Vesuvius!”
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Now everyone was laughing, Tesla, Joe Jefferson, McGovern, and even Czito. I stood there looking at them all. Then I started laughing, too.
Tesla said, “It is a lesson for us all. Too much of anything is bad. Modera- tion is the key.” Tesla brought out a bottle of whiskey and began pouring drinks. We sat down and began moderating that bottle.
“Mr. Tesla,” McGovern said, “I still don’t understand. The artificial ball lightning and that sheet of flame and electric bolts that engulfed you—that was a million volts or more of electricity going through that platform. Why did it have no effect on you?” “It is a skin effect,” Tesla said. “The electricity never passed through me at all, but rather over me. As long as the frequency of the electricity is high and the amperage is low, large voltages can move over the surface of the skin with no injury. However, it is not a stunt for amateurs. It is very easy for something to go wrong. And then the effect is fatal.”
It was nearly dawn when Tesla closed up his laboratory and said goodnight to us. Joe and McGovern went downstairs to wait for the cab. I stayed and watched Tesla as he stored away some of his machinery in cabinets. I asked, “How’s that new force of yours coming?”
“Interesting you should ask,” Tesla said. “Czito and I have been working on something, assembling it over in New Jersey. It’s a very big project.” “Just you and Czito working on it?”
“Over a hundred men have been involved in its construction directly or indirectly. But none have seen the separate parts assembled. No one knows what they have been working on. Only Kolman Czito knows what it is.” “Can I see it?”
Tesla stood up from the cabinet and turned around. He smiled at me, and seemed to be thinking something about me. Then he nodded slowly. “Someday,” Tesla said. “Someday soon I will show it to you. And you will not believe it.”
I could not imagine what it was of Tesla’s that I would not believe, because he had already shown me things that seemed impossible. But I did not ask him anything further. I knew that if Tesla said he would show me his mysterious invention, he would show me—when he was ready.
CHAPTER THREE
Your Work and My Play
He made Tom steer the ship all about and every which way, and learnt him the whole thing in nearly no time; and Tom said it was perfectly easy. He made him fetch the ship down ‘most to the earth, and had him spin her along so close to the Illinois prairies that a body could talk to farmers, and hear everything they said perfectly plain; and he f lung out printed bills to them that told about the balloon, and said it was going to Europe.
— Huck, Tom Sawyer Abroad
The day after I arrived in Chicago, Tesla made his first public demon- stration in the Electrical Exhibition Building on the grounds of the World’s Fair.
May 1st was still the scheduled Grand Opening, but on this day, Friday, April 14th, 1893, small groups of sightseers with their “inspection tickets” spread out over the grounds. Most of the fair remained fenced off, locked up, or unfinished. A handful of people strolled along the pathways beside the lagoon, stepping over sand piles and loose boards. A number of others, just fresh from the excitement of Buffalo Bill’s “Wild West Show,” made their way to the Electrical Exhibition Building. The outside of this exhibit hall had just been completed the day before with a final coat of white paint to convey the impres- sion of white marble. The paint had been applied to the walls rapidly using a new invention made especially for the fair’s construction: the paint was put into a compressing device and sprayed out in a fine mist through the end of a gas pipe. Temporary railroad tracks ran alongside the exhibit hall’s south side
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through the Court of Honor, and here and there packing crates lay stacked alongside the tracks.
Among the visitors approaching the Electrical Exhibition Building were three men who, if you looked at once, seemed like everybody else, but who, if you looked at twice, seemed a little different from anyone else. If you looked at them a third time—these three individuals would seem so strange to you that they would send shivers along your skin. But you probably would not look at these people three times; you would be looking at the fair. So these three individuals, these three strange people, passed by every- body unnoticed; or if noticed, only seen as some strange foreigners from some far-away country. These three individuals probably thought they looked a lot more like ev- eryone around them than they actually did. When we try to imitate the man- ners and dress of foreign people, we usually are blind to the small things that the foreigner considers important or significant. As a rule, our imitations are superficial and clumsy. Thus it was with these three individuals who were attempting to look like Americans on holiday. The three individuals all wore black, and looked like undertakers. But something was wrong with the cut of their clothes. The cut of their lapels were like nothing to be seen in Europe or America at that time, or any earlier time, for that matter. Each wore a black derby, but the brims of those derbies were rather wide and f lat, and the crowns were a bit tall. So their hats were not really derbies at all, or any other kind of hat. It was as if the maker of their hats had never seen a derby before but only had it described to him. Each wore spectacles with dark-colored glass, like the glass of a patent medicine bottle, the sort of spectacles worn by the blind; but these three individuals were not blind, not at all. All three of them wore heavy beards and their hair covered their ears. So the only part of their faces you could see was their noses, and a hint of their foreheads and cheeks. If you looked at them once—or twice—you might notice they had unusual papery-looking skin. If you tried for that third look—maybe through the dark glass of those spectacles—you would see something you would not want to see. In fact, you would tell yourself you did not see it, after you had seen it. You would want to believe you had not seen it, and you would go back to looking at the fair, and even forget about tr ying to look at those three strangers, until you woke up later that night in a cold sweat remem- bering what you had seen. Yes, these three individuals were different from the rest of us, all right, but they were trying to be the same, and they were succeeding—as long as nobody looked too closely. Nikola Tesla was too busy to be looking at people. For the last several days he had been supervising the installation of twelve seventy-five ton electrical generators and a 2,000 horsepower Allis-Chambers steam engine, all in the
south nave of Machinery Hall. The work was not finished, but enough had been completed to power Tesla’s show in the Electrical Exhibition Building.
But Tesla was not thinking about electricity or machines this morning. He stood on the shore of the lagoon feeding pigeons and ducks. Birds f luttered in the trees across the lagoon sensing the feeding going on at Tesla’s feet. Some of these other birds swooped over the lagoon, the blue sky shining above them, and landed near the pigeons and ducks, hoping for a morsel of their own. When Tesla saw the first fair visitors strolling along the edge of the lagoon, he threw out all his bird seed, turned around, and walked over the bridge to the exhibition buildings. He walked past the Transportation Exhibition Build- ing, walked past the Mining Exhibition Building, and on toward the Electrical Exhibition Building.
Tesla passed by a colossal statue of Benjamin Franklin holding his famous kite, through the mammoth arched entrance of the Electrical Exhibition Build- ing, and on into its interior. Inside, the building was finished, but none of the electrical exhibits had yet been installed in the second-story
mezzanine. As Tesla entered the building, he looked up at the lacework of steel and glass arches enclosing the interior space. Directly in front of him was an ornate arch topped by a sign which read:
“WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC
&
MANUFACTURING TESLA POLYPHASE SYSTEM
Beyond the arch lay General Electric’s elaborate exhibit. At its center stood an eighty-foot Columbian Column topped by an eight-foot tall incandescent light bulb, the largest in the world. Far beyond the Columbian Column on the back wall of the exhibit building was a large portrait of Columbus done in profile. Above Columbus were the words “WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC & MANUFACTURING.” Tesla’s exhibit stood below this sign. He was still working for Westinghouse, now as a consultant on a $5,000 a month retainer.
Tesla walked under the Westinghouse arch and passed in front of and around General Electric’s exhibit. He stopped, looked up at the Columbian Column and the giant light bulb perched on its top, and smiled. He then proceeded toward his exhibit, mounted the steps to the stage and looked at his machinery. He went to a control board and closed a knife-switch. A hum sounded and indicator needles on gauges swung forward to their proper places.
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A moment later Tesla heard voices echoing above the hum of his electrical machines. He turned and looked back across the exhibit hall. The first people were wandering into the exhibits. Stopping near the entrance, they were stupe- fied, looking up and around and over at everything, trying to take in all the sights in one, big glance. In a moment, the people realized that one, big glance just would not do, and so they moved forward to take in each part of the exhibits in smaller glances, glances that grew into intensified gazes of amazement. Tesla watched from his stage as the people slowly moved toward him. They were bending over the iron railings of the General Electric exhibit and point- ing at this and that. Some of them laughed. The people gazed at a display of f lickering incandescent light bulbs, each light bulb blazing out in the bright- ness of 100 watts of electricity. More people came into the hall, gentlemen in derbies and a few in straw hats, and ladies in spring bonnets and wide-brimmed, flower-trimmed hats. Then Tesla heard the cry of a baby echo through the building and saw two children, a boy and a girl dressed in sailor outfits, darting through the crowd. The boy held aloft a red and white stick of hard candy. The girl reached and grabbed it, and disappeared back into the crowd with the boy following after her.
