Free Energy Pioneer- John Worrell Keely
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From 1895 until the end of his life, Keely would find himself in one of the strangest, most complex and most significant of late 19th and early 20th century history. While he quietly struggled to master his discoveries, many foundations were shaped around him that would influence the course of history. Science, in the exploits of Keely's contemporary Tesla, made enormous leaps. Occultism rose once again, and with it, numerous esoteric and hermetic societies appeared on the surface. Keely was steadfastly working on his engine that would enable an airship and possibly even a spaceship to fly as proposed in Colville's and Astor's books. And as a haunting echo of his dreams, the years 1896 and 1897 would witness an inexplicable wave of what was referred to as airships crossing the skies over large parts of the U.S.
The year 1895, with Keely laboring day after day to perfect his inventions and to master his discovery, was the year that public interest would be renewed in his work. The year began uncertainly enough. In January, the U.S. government was on the very brink of bankruptcy. Through the financial scheming of J. Pierpont Morgan, one of Tesla's financiers, and with the help of August Delmont, a wealthy businessman, Morgan was able to secure $60 million in foreign gold reserves, thus saving the country from total bankruptcy. This incident also created a significant shift of power; it marked the rise of Morgan, also known as "the octopus" since he had a hand in almost every American industrial branch, as "the king of Wall Street."1 The year 1895 would also see the smoldering beginnings of what would eventually become the Spanish-American War.
In February, Keely submitted two circulars amongst the stockholders. In the first circular, he explained that, "It is well known that during the period of research and discovery, which has consumed about twenty-two years, I have on many occasions imagined I had neared the end of my work, and under the influence of this thought, or for the purpose of helping me over some unforeseen obstacles, I have entered into so many obligations that at the present time, even assuming that I am right now in thinking I am at the end or near enough the end of my researches to take action looking to a practical development of my system, it would be impossible for me to deliver to the world this system, in the shape of property of any commercial value, until I have positive knowledge of the character and amount of all the outstanding obligations against me. To obtain this knowledge is now the first step to be taken, before I can even offer my work for the inspection of those who may be selected to determine the soundness of my present belief in my ability to produce and deliver a commercially valuable system of Vibratory Physics."
Possibly the compelling episode a month before, in which the U.S. found itself on the brink of bankruptcy, reverberated Shockwaves among those who had financial interests in the Keely Motor Company, and thereby Keely was approached with questions and feelings of uncertainty, which prompted him to write his circulars. He continued by stating that, "...for until such disclosure of interests, claims or obligations is complete, further development of my enterprise under them is absolutely impossible."
He therefore decided to have all obligations registered by the Citizen's Trust and Surety Company of Philadelphia. The registration should take the form of "an exchange of the obligation for the Trust Company's receipt for the same; this receipt to contain a detailed description of the obligation deposited, and to carry with it a contract to return the original obligation to the owner or his assigns, at the expiration of a time to be set forth; or such equivalent obligation of a new organization as may be acceptable in full cancellation of the original claim." The circular ended by stating that persons could obtain blanks for filling out and attaching to the original obligation by writing to Keely.2
It is possible that Keely was also approached by the directors of the Keely Motor Company, who must have felt something of the threatening U.S. bankruptcy, and who wanted assurances from him. But his dissatisfaction with how business affairs were handled by the Keely Motor Company, plaguing him with court proceedings and harassing him with unreasonable demands, prompted him to establish a new company. In the second circular, Keely wrote: "...I also find the obligations entered into while I was yet groping after light in my work are impossible of execution, because they have no intelligent bearing on as it now stands; and so, in order to establish a commercial value to my former work, these old speculative obligations must be avoided entirely. I believe I am now able to produce a thoroughly practical commercial engine for the use of the force in all railways, and I wish to make such engine the basis for the organization of an entirely new company, capitalized in such a way as to enable me to accomplish something practical and of commercial value.... I propose to sell to the new company all rights for the whole world (exclusive of the territory covered by the 'Pacific Slope Concession' and the Philadelphia Manufacturing Company's contracts) in the use of the engine above mentioned. The price for this is to be the entire capital stock of the new company."
Furthermore, after the sale, Keely would return to the treasury of the newly formed company three-tenths of the capital stock, which would be divided in two-tenths "to be used to cancel all outstanding obligations," the other one-tenth "to be used to raise the working capital necessary to develop the property of the company." Seven-tenths would be kept by Keely. He would also set aside the equivalent of 51 one-hundredths of the entire capital stock "for my personal account and voting power, for a period of five years, so that it cannot be sold or given away by me during that period."
This was all necessary, explained Keely in the second circular, "to give me voting control of the company until it shall have been thoroughly established in the development of its rights under control of the engine before mentioned, and at the expiring of the trust I am to have absolute control of the capital stock covered by the same."3
Obviously Keely had discussed his plans for the formation of a new company with his supporter, Bloomfield-Moore, for under the second version of his circular she submitted a short notice, written under her nom-de-plume, H.O. Ward. In it she approved of his proposed scheme, writing that "it in no way violates the contract made with me by Mr. Keely on the 12th of April, 1890." She also urged the members of the Board to "accept Mr. Keely's terms as set down in circulars nos. I and II.. .as there then need be no further delay from want of that cooperation which now not only jeopardizes all commercial interests in Mr. Keely's inventions, but the interests and advancement of science in the long delayed announcements of the value of his great discoveries."4 While this gave the Board of Directors certainly something to ponder upon, another unexpected occurrence took place several months later.
On November 6, 1895, a newspaper wrote how interest in what was by now called the "Keely motor mystery" had again "been aroused," the reason being a published statement that a group of "New York capitalists" had become interested in Keely's inventions. But somehow, perhaps as an aftermath of his circular, or as a herald of the following year's coming events, a large part of the article was devoted to Bloomfield-Moore's dealings with Keely. And from it, we learn more about the nature of the agreement. While she had helped him from 1881 on, she apparently made an agreement with him in 1890.5 This agreement to which Keely was bound was that he must not attempt to build or construct an engine to "demonstrate in a practical way the value of his discovery, until he had entirely mastered the principles which lay at the bottom of it." Perhaps this would somehow explain the installments that Keely had made over the years.
But the term of this agreement was now drawing to a close, and for the past few months Keely "has been preparing to make a practical demonstration of his vibratory system, which is different from the one which he first discovered and abandoned because he could find no means of controlling the force."6
This did not mean that Bloomfield-Moore disposed of her interest, instead her "chief anxiety" was that someone other than Keely would possess his secret, and that it might not "die with him before the apparatus for utilizing the newly-discovered force shall have been patented." In her view, until such patents were issued,
the stock of the Keely Motor Company would only have "speculative value." Bloomfield-Moore also "removed the restriction" from Keely, who would "soon commence the construction of a railway traction engine," the plan of which he had set forth in his February circular. "The researches being concluded, he says he can now devote his energies to the utilization of this hitherto unknown force."7
The New York capitalists who so expressed their interest in Keely visited and talked with him and were "favorably impressed with what they saw," so they would "probably become financially interested as well in the Keely enterprise." And a mighty group this was: the puissant rich John Jacob Astor; William K. Vanderbilt; William Cullen Brewster, president of the Fifth Avenue Trust Company; and other unidentified New York millionaires.8 Astor had already purchased a large interest in the Keely motor "from a person who for some years had been an enthusiastic advocate of Mr. Keely."9
Never before was Keely approached by such an extremely wealthy group, and the news of the group traveled far and wide. One of Tesla's acquaintances wrote an alarming letter to Tesla, expressing his "astonishment at Astor's gullibility" in investing money in Keely's discoveries.10 The reason for this alarm was that Tesla himself was trying to obtain funds from Astor.
The news also reached the directors of the Keely Motor Company. They responded by "proposing some sort of settlement of the business questions existing between the company on the one hand and Mr. Keely and his patroness, Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, on the other," very likely also meaning the announcement in February of Keely's plans to establish a new company. Bloomfield-Moore rejected their propositions and stayed "in negotiations with Mr. Astor and other New York capitalists."
Nothing came of it however. "The negotiations that have been pending for some time between John Jacob Astor, William K. Vanderbilt, William Cullen Brewster and other New York millionaires, Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore and Keely for the control of Mrs. Moore's interest in the Keely motor have come to an end. At a conference in this city on Thursday, at which were present Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, John Jacob Astor, William Cullen Brewster, J.K. Lorrimer, H.O. Ward and others, the question of organizing a Keely Power Company, to bring out Keely's invention when complete, was discussed."
One of the conditions of the wealthy New Yorkers was that Keely would move to New York. There the millionaires would "erect for him a new building and back him to the extent of several millions." The proposition was rejected, because neither Bloomfield-Moore nor Keely "would consent to the latter going to New York." Furthermore, both rejected the idea of forming a new company until a demonstration had been given of "certain operations of the invention." Another reason was that Bloomfield-Moore and Keely wanted to prevent speculation in Keely stock until the inventor had completed a patentable machine."
One of the reasons for Keely and Bloomfield-Moore's rejection of the proposition of Keely moving to New York might have been that they had the chilling thought fresh in mind of Tesla's New York laboratory that had mysteriously burned to the ground in March of the same year.12 The incident was widely noted in the press. Probably Bloomfield-Moore learned more of this disastrous incident first hand. She had been aware of Tesla's work since at least 1893. She also corresponded with Tesla on several occasions and met with him at least once, although in Tesla's letters to her that have survived there is no mention of the fire that destroyed his laboratory and many years of work. But from his letters we learn that he studied Keely's theories and was aware of the inventor from Philadelphia, although largely from a distance.
Thus towards the end of the year before, Tesla wrote to her in a letter that, "I sincerely wish that I would share your opinion about Keely and his works. That he has ingenuity and skill in experimenting I will readily believe. But his method is an unscientific one and his exposition is wanting in the extreme. It is painful to read his theories. Can he have recognized something and yet be utterly incapable of expressing it? This seems impossible for there is no truth which cannot be told in simple language. The best I can do after all I have heard of him from Mr. Theodore Puskas,13 Mr. Andrews and others who have been thrown in close contact with Keely is to say that I pity him. I devotedly wish that you may be spared the pain of deception. The solution will eventually come but from other quarters. I myself am only one of many, who believe to have found a way and who strive and hope to accomplish... ofyour esteem. Please take care of your health and guard yourself against influences which can only result in a disadvantage to you."14
Tesla's harsh criticism on Keely's methodology did not cool Bloomfield-Moore's relationship with Tesla; why not see for himself instead of forming an opinion based on second-hand comments and the reading of Keely's visionary prose? So she invited him to come to Keely's workshop. A month after the fire that destroyed his laboratory, with Tesla obviously having other things on his mind, he replied to her in writing concerning her invitation: "I could not have accepted your invitation (to witness Keely's demonstrations) nor express myself in regard to Keely, but I wish to assure you sincerely that I would be very pleased to comply with your wishes in any other way. You are evidently following a noble and generous impulse in defending Keely, and I only wish that he would be worthy about your duties to yourself. You must not sacrifice your own welfare for others whomever they may be."15
And like Edison who had rejected an invitation some 17 years before him, Tesla would also never meet Keely. Notwithstanding Tesla's evasive maneuvers towards Keely, he felt different for Bloomfield-Moore, as his correspondence continued in the warmest of tones: "You are a noble-hearted woman and your evident anxiety makes me feel keener the disappointment of not being able to respond to your invitation. For many years I have been at work on great ideas. I have used scientific methods in the investigations of the problems which I proposed myself to solve and my progress in these fields though very slow was nevertheless sure. Now, after all these efforts in overcoming great obstacles when I have partially reached my dreams I cannot afford to dissipate my energies which many scientific men say are precious for my fellow men."16
In a subsequent letter, Tesla further expressed his concern over Bloomfield-Moore's health: "I hope that you will soon free yourself from your obligations here and go abroad as the affairs which you are devoting at present your attention to are certainly telling on your nerves. I regret this the more as I fear that your energies are wasted on a task which is not worthy to mankind as a single hour of your life."17
While Tesla never visited Keely, he did come to Philadelphia on a number of occasions - in 1893 when he lectured at the Franklin Institute during which he told the audiences about his visions of the precursor to television,18 and again in May 1895, when he, Edison and Alexander Graham Bell met during the National Electrical Exposition.19 It is not known if Keely attended any of these occasions. Based on the documentation that is at hand, there is no indication that Keely ever mentioned Tesla, or referred to him in either a negative or positive sense.
There is documentary evidence that the same year Tesla visited Bloomfield-Moore in Philadelphia at least on one occasion; on a letter, she scribbled, "After Tesla's visit to me in Philadelphia he wrote." In the letter, Tesla expressed his fascination with Bloomfield-Moore: "I need not assure that I have been deeply touched by your evident kindness for me. Yet, I would wish you were not so, for I feel that I am unfair as my whole soul is wrapped up in the investigation I am pursuing. It has grieved me to be a helpless onlooker on the last occasion for I would have much desired to help you, at least in sound advice. Please remember what I told you about your duties to yourself. You must not sacrifice your own welfare for others whomever they may be. Please take care of your health. You know that at your age one has not a very great receptive power. Your weakness at the moment of my leaving you Sunday evening alarmed me and I reproached myself for having remained so long depriving you of the much needed rest. But I was so interested in you that I forgot my duty. To be frank with you anything concerning Keely has not the faintest interest for me."20
John Jacob Astor (1864-1912) was one of the wealthiest men on earth, with assets somewhere around $100 million. By comparison, powerful Morgan, "the king of Wall Street" and one of Tesla's financiers, had amassed a fortune of $30 million.22 John Jacob Astor was not only a multimillionaire and a distant relative of Theodore Roosevelt, but also an inventor with a visionary mind. He is characterized as a somewhat estranged man, a playboy who was dominated by his mother and his wife. He showed early on a talent for things mechanical, and he owned a workshop at Ferncliff, where his vivid imagination played on the possibilities of copper tubing, wires and electric currents. Later he built his own laboratory, in which he produced inventions such as a bicycle brake, a new kind of marine turbine engine, and a machine for removing surface dirt from roads. He was one of the first Americans to own a motor car.23 Another of his inventions, a pneumatic walkway, won a prize at the 1893 Chicago World Fair. Other inventions included a storage battery, an internal combustion engine and a flying machine. One of his dreams was to find a way to create rain by pumping warm air from the surface of the earth into the upper atmosphere, an original idea, but one that the U.S. Patent Office turned down.24 Complex and furtive as Astor was, he also had a reputation for eccentricity; he started writing his cryptic novel A Journey In Other Worlds in 1892, when he was only 28 years old.