Having seen all this, Leidy was given to a futuristic extrapolation of his own: "Some day.. .I suppose a young lady will be able to play on the piano and set her father's mill to grinding. I see no possible source of deception. This demonstration is wonderful. There is no explanation of the effect thus produced, except by vibratory force such as Keely assigns as the cause."75
A month later, on May 8, Keely suddenly announced that he was finally ready. It was a rainy day in Philadelphia, with "nothing to break the silence of the street outside save the jingling bells of an occasional car. The air of the workshop, outer and inner sanctum, was as still as the murk of a tomb is supposed to be," a reporter with an obvious feeling for atmosphere wrote. "I have finished my work! I have discovered my force! I have accomplished my task!" Keely said to the startled reporter.76 He also told him that "there is nothing for me to do but to wait until the mechanics can make me a perfect machine. When that is done I will at once demonstrate my discovery to the world. That is my great, and, indeed, my only difficulty now! The apparatus with which I am compelled to work is, and has been, mechanically defective. When it is correctly made I will challenge the world to deny what I affirm with and through it! "77
The reporter who dutifully wrote Keely's statements down was greatly impressed and drew an interesting description of him at that time: "John Ernest Worrell Keely stood with his elbow resting on one of his 'syrens,' the name he gives to a machine which sings, he says, and makes the atoms of universal ether dance. It was the first time I saw him alone, face to face," the reporter wrote, "Here he was, six feet one inch in height.. .heavy black eyebrows over deep-set, earnest brown eyes; high cheekbones over which rested the legs of the 'artificial eyes' his researches had long since reduced him to; a thick, black shock of hair, slightly streaked with gray; slightly bent across the broad shoulders and looking me straight in the eyes, with an expression at first guarded, almost crafty, soon opening into apparent confidence."78
Keely also confided to the reporter that his force was "not like steam, nor electricity, nor compressed air, nor galvanism — it is none of these, and it is not akin to any one of them." He also made a statement that would become quite familiar in the years ahead of him; "Now, if outside mechanics can make my instruments, I am all right. If they can't, I will have to wait until I find one who can."79
In 1890, the then world famous palmist Cheiro visited Keely's workshop,80 a place that was the scene of so many wonders. Forty-five years later, Cheiro would publish his memoirs of this visit, along with other materials about him. Although sympathetic, these memoirs do not serve to clarify matters as they are untrustworthy, as are his other writings about him elsewhere, which we will see in chapter 9.
According to Cheiro, it was in Bloomfield-Moore's London house that he first heard of "the Keely-Motor."81 At Keely's workshop, Cheiro amongst others witnessed his antigravity experiments and a "revolving globe of glass... It was of very simple construction, merely a large glass globe balanced on a pivot of platinum that, when spinning, kept its equilibrium by centrifugal action. ...This globe was also started by a vibration from the violin. When it had attained considerable velocity, Keely made me lift it off the table and carry the whole thing, wooden stand and all, several times round the room. As its revolutions became more and more rapid I grew alarmed, believing it might any moment fly to pieces. Again a discord from the violin and in a few minutes it stopped."82 Unfortunately, as Cheiro's account is inaccurate, the question remains open if this was merely a distorted memory, or indeed a description of a device that Keely had actually built.
The year that Cheiro visited Keely, foreign publications again wrote about him and his discoveries. In March the Anglo-Austria contained two papers on the subject, and in October the London periodical Invention published its opinion that amongst others, reiterated Professor Leidy's visit.83
Yet in the autumn of that year, Keely would find himself again threatened with lawsuits and harassed by demands to give demonstrations in order to raise the price of stock. A subscription was even started to raise funds for the prosecution. Keely now found himself in a difficult position. He had to choose to either continue his research with, as the ultimate end, the completion of his system, or to divert his course and to resume his efforts on the construction and perfection of an engine that could be patented and made commercially profitable.
At this point, an attempt was made to hand out a written statement in which Keely explained that it would be far more profitable in the end if he could continue his research, since in the preceding years he had done "scarcely more than liberating the ether." The effort to circulate his statement failed, but instead an unfavorable expose of the history of the company was circulated.84 Around the same time news about him and his discoveries had not only been published across the United States, but also in foreign publications and theosophical magazines.85
Towards the end of January, 1893, he invited 30 "sanguine capitalists and promoters" from Philadelphia, New York, Chicago and Boston, to his shop to investigate the progress of his work on the development of the motor. The delegation assembled at Collier's office at 910 Walnut Street and held a meeting with closed doors. Those present were also pledged to maintain silence on the details of what they subsequently heard and saw. Collier read a report written by Keely on the progress he had made so far, explaining the difficulties that were delaying his success. Those that were present said that, although they could not give out any details concerning the report, Keely assured them that success was imminent and a "limited time and amount of money he would require to complete the greatest motor the world has ever known." After the meeting the assembly was driven to his workshop where for two hours he demonstrated his devices and explained the workings of the different parts of the machinery and the application of the new force.86
One who was present, a Jacob Bunn Jr. who was the vice president of the Illinois Watch Company, later told the press that he was not at liberty to give the contents of the report, or the names of those present, "except to say that they were men of large capital, who were accompanied in their visit of inspection by some of the best engineers and scientists of this country." Much of what he had seen was "wonderful," and he could only agree "with all the others, including the scientific men present, that Mr. Keely has discovered and utilized to a measure a seemingly new and powerful force which is understood alone by himself."87
Keely said that he had provided himself with "suitable furnaces and tools," and would begin immediately with "the difficult task of making these wheels" himself. "I can make them perfectly," Keely allegedly said, "and when this is accomplished I will put in motion a power that can run a train without fuel of any kind or any other force for thousands of years continuously if desired."88
Notwithstanding these claims, the public once again lost its interest, although the book Keely and his Discoveries: Aerial Navigation, written by Bloomfield-Moore, and published in London in October, fuelled the interest in England to a considerable extent. So much so that Prof. Dewar of the Royal Institution in England, who had "liquified oxygen" and was "the foremost chemist in England in all matters pertaining to gases" was asked if it was true that Keely would place all the facts relating to his motor in Dewar's hands. Two years before that, Dewar agreed to investigate Keely's engines if he went to America. However, by 1893 Dewar had still not visited America, but he remarked, 'Two days ago I received a letter from Mrs. Moore, written in Philadelphia, saying that Mr. Keely had completed his system and no longer needs sympathy or endorsement.89
But that grandiose millennium of power — evoked by Keely's completed system — had to wait for another year. The end, though, was now in sight, or so it was told at the annual meeting of the stockholders of the Keely Motor Company. Only a small representation of the stock "put in an appearance." A minimum of 50,001 shares were required to reach a quorum, therefore, no meeting was held. According to Secretary Schuellerman, this was not that much of a problem since there was "no
business of importance to be transacted" anyway, and the stockholders were already informed that "in a few months all the arrangements of Mr. John W. Keely toward perfecting the machine which is to revolutionize power production will be completed, and patents will be taken out in all parts of the civilized world." A 200-horsepower commercial engine that had been "in construction for a long time" was delivered to Keely's laboratory the week before. This would not mean that the device would be ready for use immediately; a "large amount of adjustment and graduation" had to be done, but when this was completed, Schuellerman added, Keely would secure patents for all of his inventions. 90
The year 1894 came, and as a consequence of Schuellerman's statement the year before, excitement filled the air in Philadelphia. A newspaper reported that, "It has been known for some time that Keely has his motor about ready for commercial work... "91 a statement that was foreshadowed by a newspaper a year ago, which proclaimed: "It appears that Keely is still alive, and that his motor is once more just about to move. "92 But the years of hard labor had taken their toll on Keely; it was also reported that his eyesight was "somewhat impaired and he works under difficulties," a condition that was described by a visiting scientist of Boston as "half blind."93
The scientist was so taken with what he witnessed in Keely's workshop that he confided his experiences in a long letter to a newspaper, which show a marked contrast with other, more superficial reports on Keely's doings. This was not that surprising, as the scientist admitted that, "Impelled by a life long interest in the wonders of natural science and honored by the personal friendship of Mr. Keely and a few of his advisers, he has followed the course of this investigator for years."
And impressed the scientist was: "I have seen a spectacle I would have pronounced impossible, according to all the accepted theories of physics with which I am familiar. Without apparent exhibition of heat, electricity or any other form of energy hitherto operated by man, I have seen a strong metallic wheel, weighing some seventy pounds, in swift and steady revolution by the hour, and absolutely without cost.. .Long we stand around that flying wheel. The friend who photographed it at rest, again levels his camera upon it. In vain, its spokes cannot tarry long enough to be caught in its snare. It is still as death and almost as mysterious. We listen to long dissertations upon the reason for the relative positions of the eight discs on the wheel and the nine on the stationary rim, and how the adjustment can be so altered that instead of a revolution there will be a violent oscillation back and forth. We are shown the corresponding wheel and the rim of the large engine close by which is to bear the discs, not singly, but in groups, the steel resonating drum with the circles of tubes inside, the 35-inch Chladni plate underneath, the sympathetic transmitter on top, the extra wheel bearing on its spokes cylindrical cases, each filled solid with a hundred thin curved plates of steel, to get the utmost superficial areas, we are told."
And where Keely had complained the year before that two wheels of copper tubing were made imperfect, and had stated that he would make these himself, the scientist now wrote: "The engine you have been looking upon requires as part of itself... certain heavy tubular copper rings. Skillful artisans failed in various endeavors, by electrical deposition and otherwise, to make them right. The inventor contrived machinery for bending into semi-circles sections of copper tube one and one-half inch bore, three-eighths of an inch thick, forcing a steel ball through them to keep the tube in shape. To make a ring he placed two of these half circles together, and joined the ends in some way without heat, by what he calls 'sympathetic attraction' so that the resonant properties of the rings are satisfactory, and though you see the line of union, the two parts cannot be severed. You see one of these rings, some fifteen inches in diameter, hanging by a block and tackle from the ceiling, and lashed to the lower half swings a big iron ball weighing 550 pounds and there it has swung for weeks."
Now was as good as any time to remember some good tales of the past; "Nothing is said now," wrote the Bostonian scientist, "of other wonders of which other witnesses can speak, and which are said to have appeared in the slow progress this incomprehensible man has been making all these years; of a pressure obtained from the disintegration of water by vibration, of 20,000 pounds to the square inch; of a slowly revolving drum which went no slower when winding tightly upon itself a stout inch and one-half rope fastened to a beam, and no faster when the rope parted under the strain; of the disintegration of rock into impalpable powder; of raising heavy weights by aid of a 'vibratory lift,' recalling the 'negative gravity' of our modern storyteller."94
The year 1894 would also witness the appearance of two remarkable and futuristic novels, written in the vein of the "modern story tellers," that bore a direct relation with the visionary ideas of the enigmatic inventor. The first novel, titled Dashed Against the Rock, was written by theosophist, freemason and medium William Colville. His book was written after conversations with Keely, portrayed in the novel as the character "Aldebaran." The character of Professor Monteith was in real life Prof. Wentworth Lascelles-Scott, an acquaintance of Bloomfield-Moore. In his introduction, Colville made it very clear that, "In presenting to the public the following extraordinary romance, I wish to be distinctly understood that I am not in any sense the author of the scientific dissertations and tables which form a considerable portion of the volume. .. .The unusual and distinctly technical terminology employed in some of the most important sections of this story may be considered out of place in a tale containing some amusing incidents and ostensibly published as a novel... .I had no alternative but to what I have done or suppress this priceless knowledge altogether, for I have only received it on trust from a friend who is its custodian in a sense that I am not...I do not pose as a teacher; I am in these pages only a recorder."95
The most remarkable portions, aside from a wealth of materials pertaining to Keely's underlying philosophies,96 were clear and definite descriptions of a proposed airship that would be built in such a way that with it one could also travel to the nearby planets and stars.97 For these were the years that Keely was more and more contemplating not only a system of aerial flight, but from the text we may assume, even space flight. After all, Keely had been working on what was to become a complex engine for aerial navigation since 1887.
The second novel in certain aspects even outclassed the first; for whereas in Colville's novel we find rudimentary proposals for an airship, capable of traveling to the stars and nearby planets, in the second novel a ship did exactly this, all the way to Jupiter. This novel was A Journey In Other Worlds written by John Jacob Astor, one of the most wealthy men on earth and an acquaintance of Bloomfield-Moore.98 Both books showed something of the far-reaching nature of Keely's visions.
It also demonstrated that these were to be Keely's most interesting years, as they show something of the spirit and the mind of the inventor who was forever pushing back the frontiers of known science and even groping for the stars. In the process, he would construct device after device and discard equally as many, becoming utterly incomprehensible to his contemporaries.
A reporter later remarked that he "found himself unable to follow Keely's explanations of the abstract principles on account of his unfamiliarity with the nomenclature of the new science...," and that he had to "abandon all preconceived notions of natural philosophy if he thought to make any progress in the study of the new power. The laws of gravity, as laid down by Newton, magnetism, as formulated by Faraday, Henry and others; light and heat, as outlined by Lord Kelvin, and the correlation of forces had to give way to this mysterious force, which practically creates something out of nothing, if we may unquestionably adopt the discoverer's theories."99
But no matter how far Keely's inner vision stretched, little understood by some and more fully appreciated by others, the troubles with his eyesight continued, necessitating a medical examination. On this, Bloomfield-Moore wrote: "Last week I received a letter from Schuellerman, telling me that when the final trial was made of Mr. Keely
's eye, he wept for joy that his sight was restored..."
To her, Keely wrote: "My dearest and ever remembered friend, it is with the most exceeding pleasure that I can thus prove to you the perfection of my sight; and to be thus enabled to gratify my most ardent desire of sympathetic communication by letter to yourself."100
4
The Power Millennium Keely's Last Years
"The dawn of a new revelation has already begun to shed its light which will show to the nations that pure science is true religion and the one sympathetic association with Deity. "
John Keely in a letter to Clara Bloomfield-Moore
dated May 30, 1894
"Tesla has reached out almost to the crest of the harmonic wave, leaving all electrical explorers far behind him. "
Clara Bloomfield-Moore
Keely and his Discoveries, Aerial Navigation, 1893
Free Energy Pioneer- John Worrell Keely Page 11
