New York Herald Tribune
Aug. 22, 1937
In the realm of science: Tesla, who predicted radio, now looks Forward to sending waves to the moon
Inventor Hopes to Use Energy-Transmitting Device to Make Spot Glow on Lunar Surface
Theory Is Traced To '97 Experiments
His Mechanism to Use Vast Natural Forces, Possibly Cosmic Rays
By John J. O'Neill
The failure of forecasters to predict the results of scientific discoveries,
particularly with respect to their social and economic significance, was
emphasized in the recent report on technical trends and their social
implications submitted to President Roosevelt by the National Resources
Committee. One of the outstanding oversights was radio broadcasting. None of the
previewers of coming events saw this development of radio communication.
With this as justification, some attention might be given to the recent announcement by Nikola Tesla, the inventor, whose mind has given us a great many of the major developments forming the foundation of our electrical age. Dr. Tesla seldom writes for publication, but back in 1900 he wrote an article for the June issue of "The Century Magazine," which contained predictions that seemed at that time very fantastic. Those who may read it now will be amazed to find how many of the author's prophecies have proved true.
Advance Seen Fantastic
Some of the advances described by him during the last few years as the result of
his investigations may appear equally fantastic today, but one has only to know
of Dr. Tesla's past performances in order to have faith that given time and
money they could be made realities. Forty years ago he was playing with
electrical discharges of many millions of volts, while today scientists have
difficulty in developing a fraction of those potentials for their atom-smashing
and x-ray experiments. Long before the days of Marconi, Tesla girdled the earth
with giant electrical waves from his high voltage generators, and on the basis
of this work predicted both the "transmission of intelligence without
wires" and the "wireless transmission of power.. He controlled a
vessel at a distance by wireless power forty years before the advent of our
present-day manless aerial torpedoes.
"They laughed at me in 1897 when I told them about the cosmic ray,. he said
in a recent interview. "Fifty years ago they attempted to discredit my
discovery of the rotating magnetic field and my system of power transmission by
alternating currents. They called me crazy when I predicted the radio and when I
sent the first impulse around the world they said it couldn't be done..
So with Tesla's latest discoveries and inventions. There may be many who are
skeptical, but the world is moving forward rapidly and man is constantly doing
things a short time before considered impossible. Forty years ago Tesla was
predicting world-wide radio communications. Today this accomplishment is
history. Now he is predicting interplanetary communication.
Jovian Bolts His Aim
Dr. Tesla gave assurance that he did not mean just sending weak signals, but
veritable Jovian bolts carrying energy of several thousand horsepower which
would be able to produce tremendous effects at the receiving end, even though it
be infinitely remote. A test of this invention could be made most advantageously
on our nearest heavenly neighbor, the moon. Sufficient energy, he said, could be
transmitted to render a small spot on its surface incandescent so that it could
be easily observed from the earth.
This is a further extension of the announcement previously made by Dr. Tesla
that he would be able to transmit over a beam of not more than one hundred
thousandths of a square centimeter in cross section adequate amounts of energy
for operating all kinds of machinery at distances limited only by the earth's
curvature. Such a beam, he pointed out, could be used not only for constructive
but also destructive purposes as annihilating military forces or aerial fleets.
While Dr. Tesla is keeping a deep secret of the mechanism by which he plans to
provide unlimited energy, it is apparent he is bent on using natural forces that
operate on a vast scale. To be specific, it seems that the energy is coming to
us in the form of cosmic rays, but Tesla's theory of these rays is different
from those of Dr. Robert A. Millikan or Dr. Karl T. Compton.
He formulated his theory in 1897 when he sought to explain the production of the
phenomena of radio activity by some other means than atomic explosions. He held
that all energy an atom exhibits is received from its environment and does not
come from itself. Accordingly, he explained radio activity as a result of the
shattering of atoms by sub-atomic cosmic particles. Whence did they come? was
the question.
"Now, of all bodies in the cosmos," states Dr. Tesla, "our sun
was the most likely to furnish a clue as to their origin and character. Before
the electron theory was advanced, I had established that radio-active rays
consisted of particles of primary matter not further decomposable, and the first
thing to find out was whether the sun is charged to a sufficiently high
potential to produce the effects noted. This called for a prolonged
investigation which culminated in my discovery that the sun's potential was
216,000,000,000 volts and that all such large and hot bodies emit cosmic rays.
Puzzle of Mystery Rays
"While the origin and character of the rays observed near the earth's
surface had thus been sufficiently well ascertained, the so-called cosmic rays
observed at great altitudes presented a riddle for more than twenty-six years,
chiefly because it was found they increased with the height at a rapid rate. My
investigations brought out the astonishing fact that the effects at high
altitude are of an entirely different nature, having no relation whatever to
cosmic rays. These are particle. from celestial bodies at very high temperatures
and charged to enormous electrical potentials."
It might be remarked parenthetically that Dr. Tesla does not accept the concept
of the electron presented by physicists as an elementary unit and carrying a
unit charge of electricity. He holds that the electron in a well-exhausted tube
operated at high potential carries many multiples of this unit charge. The
ignorance of this fact is responsible for many errors and fallacies in various
scientific investigations.
"The effects at great elevations," Dr. Tesla continued, "are due
to waves of extremely small lengths produced by the sun in a certain region of
the atmosphere. This is the discovery I wish to make known. The process involved
in the generation of the waves is the following: The sun projects charged
particles constituting an electric current which passes through a conducting
stratum of the atmosphere approximately ten kilometers (six miles) thick
enveloping the earth. This is a transmission of electrical energy exactly as I
illustrated in my experimental lecture in which one end of a wire is connected
to an electric generator of high potential, its other end being free. In this
case the generator is represented by the sun and the wire by the conducting air.
Production of the Waves
"The passage of solar current involves the transference of electric charges
from particle to particle with the speed of light, resulting in the production
of extremely short and penetrating waves. As the air stratum mentioned is the
source of the waves it follows that the so-called cosmic rays observed at great
altitude must increase as this stratum is approached."
Another of the Tesla inventions is a radically new tube which is indestructible
and can handle heavy currents up to any voltage that can be produced, even
100,000,000 volts. It will be useful, he promises, in the production of cheap
radium substitutes and in the transformation of matter. Still another invention
consists in means for the production of a practically perfect vacuum of the
order of 1,000,000,000th of a micron.
While Dr. Tesla does not say so, it is assumed that these latter inventions are
parts of the system which he would use in the transmission of energy to the moon
or other planets. Such an application would be spectacular, but the inventions
when described and made public would have applications of more immediate
practical value in industrial operations.
He was honored on his birthday by the bestowal of the highest distinctions
within the power of Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, which recognition touched him
deeply, all the more as Konstantin Fotitch and Vladimir Hurban, ministers of
these countries, came from Washington especially for the occasion. Dr. Tesla is
now eighty-one and works continuously at his investigations. He has not been
halted even by a recent accident in which he was knocked down by a taxicab. It
merely caused the customary bruises and upset the digestion a bit, he said.