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MINUTES OF THE ANNUAL MEETING OF THE
AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS, HELD AT THE ENGINEERING
SOCIETIES BUILDING, NEW YORK CITY, FRIDAY EVENING, MAY 18, 1917
President Buck called
the meeting to order at 8:30 o'clock.
THE PRESIDENT: As you
know, gentlemen, this is the Annual Meeting of the Institute, and the
first thing on the program will be the presentation of the Report of the
Board of Directors by our Secretary, Mr. Hutchinson.
SECRETARY HUTCHINSON:
The annual report of the Institute for the year has been printed and
distributed, and it is not my intention to take the time to read it. It
consists of a brief resume of the activities of the institute for the
entire year, and includes abstracts of the reports of the various
committees.
THE PRESIDENT:
Gentlemen, the next order of business of the evening will be the
announcement of the election of officers and managers for the coming
year. The report of the Tellers will be presented by the Secretary, Mr.
Hutchinson.
Secretary Hutchinson
then presented the report of the Tellers, which showed elections as
follows:
President:
W. W. Rice, Jr.
Vice-Presidents:
Frederich Bedell,
John H. Finney,
A. S. McAllister
Managers:
Walter A. Hall,
William A. DelMar,
Wilfred Sykes
Treasurer:
George A. Hamilton
THE PRESIDENT: It is
our privilege from time to time to honor those in the electrical
profession who have rendered conspicuous service towards this advance.
We have the pleasure this evening of so honoring Mr. Nikola Tesla. Dr.
Kennelly, who is Chairman of the Edison Medal Committee, will tell us
what the Edison Medal is and what it stands for. I take pleasure in
introducing Dr. A. E. Kennelly.
DR. A. E. KENNELLY:
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: It is my privilege to say a few
words to you upon the origin and purpose of the Edison Medal. First of
all, many people suppose that the Edison Medal is a medal presented by
Mr. Edison. That is a mistake. Mr. Edison has been so busy during his
life receiving medals that he has not time for the delivery of any. The
Edison Medal owes its existence to the action of a group of his admirers
who in a very remarkable Deed of Gift, a printed copy of which I have
here, have set apart a fund for the purpose of the annual award of a
medal for meritorious achievement in the electrical science and art.
This deed of gift originally recited, in 1904, that the medal should be
annually awarded for the best graduating thesis by the students of
electrical engineering in the United States and Canada, but in the years
that elapsed between 1904 and 1908, I think I am correct in saying that
there were no successful candidates, at least for the medal under those
terms, although there may have been many aspirants. It is supposed that
the dignity of the medal and the junior character of the tyros
restrained them in their modesty from making proper application.
Be that as it may,
finding that the applicants held back under the original terms of the
deed of gift, the matter was taken up further and the original body of
men redrafted the deed and placed it in the hands of the American
Institute of Electrical Engineers to award the medal, under the choice
of a Committee, annually, for meritorious achievement, as indicated, to
any resident of the United States, its dependencies, or Canada, during
each administration year. The monument which they raised to Mr. Edison
by their act is, I think you will admit, one of the most wonderful that
has ever been raised to any scientist.
The Deed of Gift says
that there shall be twenty-four members appointed by the American
Institute of Electrical Engineers, sixteen from the membership at large,
three ex officio members, the President, Secretary and Treasurer, and
the balance from the Board of Directors.
Every year the medal is
due to be awarded. There have been already six medals awarded, not
counting the medal which is to be awarded to-night, and the recipients
of these medals have been Elihu Thomson, Frank J. Sprague, George
Westinghouse, William Stanley, Charles F. Brush, Alexander Graham
Bell. I think you will say that is a fitting selection for the galaxy
of names that we look forward to in the future, all of them, in honoring
Mr. Edison's achievements, which have been so noteworthy, that every
household in the land holds his name as a cherished household word. We
may look forward to a time say a thousand years hence, when, like this
evening, the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, or its
successors or assigns, shall be convoked, and at which the medal of the
year will be awarded to its One Thousand and Seventh recipient, and all
that long galaxy of names will represent those individuals who have
contributed to the recognition of the achievements of Mr. Edison and his
gift to humanity.
In addition to what
this deed of gift shows in honor of Mr. Edison himself, there is, of
course, the very great honor that it bestows upon the recipient. The
Deed of Gift says there shall be twenty-four jurors, which you see is
twice the number of jurors that is allowed in the palladium of our
liberties, but whereas the jurors of ordinary life convict by unanimous
vote, the twenty-four jurors of the Edison Medal convict, at least, by a
two-thirds vote, so I think I am correct in saying that their
convictions have hitherto been entirely unanimous, and in this
particular case I can certainly declare that it has been unanimous.
The galaxy of names
that will be produced and has already been produced under this deed of
gift will be great and noteworthy. It will not be necessary to look
into a "Who's Who" to see who has been great and notorious and worthy of
merit in electrical science and art. The historian of the future will
simply say "Give me the list of the Edison Medallists."
This deed of gift is
also wonderful in other respects. It has marvelous flexibility and
marvelous rigidity in certain directions. It provides for the
possibility of a change of personnel, a change of procedure and a change
of administration as time and things may change. It only makes one
rigid restriction, and that is that the name "Edison Medal" shall never
be changed. Times may change and persons and institutions, the
Institute itself may go out of existence, and there is provided
machinery whereby if the Institute should say it is tired, or it has
gone out of existence, or can no longer administer the medal, that the
five oldest universities of the country, maintaining a course in
electrical engineering, shall be able to place the administration of the
medal by their vote in the hands of some new institution, so you see
that this is a very wonderful Deed of Gift that I have the honor of
bringing to your notice here this evening in connection with the
bestowal of this medal. Another great advantage that the medal presents
is that its recipient shall be alive, that is to say he must not only
have been convicted of great merit and meritorious achievement, but he
must also have escaped being run over by automobiles up to the time of
the presentation. That represents a great advance over those methods of
awarding distinction which depend upon the demise of the individual.
You know somebody has said that a great statesman is a successful
politician who is dead, but we may say that the Edison Medallist is a
great electrician who is alive, and you know it is wonderful how little
is known sometimes about a man's demise, however much may be known about
his work. The other day I met a negro in the South, and I happened to
mention Washington, and what was done by George Washington who died so
many years ago, and he said, "For de Lawd's sake, I doant even heard the
man was sick." So you see that even George Washington, no matter how
meritorious he might have been in electrical matters, could not possibly
be the recipient of an Edison medal.
We have recently
received the sad news in this country of the demise of the great English
electrical engineer Silvanus P. Thomson, a man who had many admirers and
many friends in this country, many students here, a man whose name and
work is dear to so many of us, and efforts are now being made to
contribute to a fitting memorial for him by the purchase of his library
as an appendix to the great library of the British Institution of
Electrical Engineers, and a notice is given on page 126 of the May
Proceedings of the Institute regarding that movement, and you will find
it a very worthy movement. Subscription lists are open to the members
of this Institute, as a matter of courtesy, and a matter of recognition,
that so many of his friends in this country could be allowed to give
some contribution to this great Thomson Memorial. It is a fact, as I
dare say many of you know, that the funds for Lord Kelvin's Memorial
Window in Westminster Abbey were largely raised in America, more
largely, I believe, than they were in England itself. In this case I am
led to believe that they do not want the funds so much, as they want the
names of sympathizers with the project, the support of those who
recognize the work and merit of Silvanus P. Thomson. But how much
better it would be if we were presenting a memorial to Silvanus P.
Thomson living, as we are able to do in the case of the Edison Medal,
than presenting a memorial to Silvanus P. Thomson passed away.
Then one thing more:
This deed of gift between its lines suggests a third and by no means
least important purpose, and that is a safeguard, lest we forget. We in
this time and of this continent, particularly we of the electrical
profession, with our faces ever turned to the rising sun, are so apt to
forget that there has been a preceding night of trouble, difficulty and
dismay, and that the tools of our trade which lie to our hand were only
secured by hard work and toil against all sorts of distress and
discouragements. The Edison Medal is our means for reviving your
memories of the past and pointing out that the things we look upon as
the sunshine of heaven now have been arrived at by the hard work, the
inspiration, or, as Edison himself would say, the perspiration of those
who have worked in the past.
We remember that
beautiful book, "The Twins", where Budge and Toddy the children always
insisted at all times of the day and night to see the wheels go 'round
and have their father's watch opened for them. The medallist to-night
was a man who saw in his mind wheels going around when there was no
means of getting alternating current motors to rotate, when the
alternating current would do everything but make wheels go 'round, and
he devised the rotating magnetic field so prophetically in his mind's
eye that the rotating magnetic wheel would set wheels going 'round all
over the land and all over the world, and the vision is carried out, and
we recognize that vision here, and the Medal is partly as a reminder
that we should not forget the fact, that the medallist also made the
phenomenon of high frequency known to us all practically for the first
time, and that what he showed was a revelation to science and art unto
all time.
For this third purpose
the Edison Medal has been created, and we may look far forward into the
future and see it given year after year for, let us hope, a thousand
years from now, in the year 2917, to witness the ceremony which we may
well expect will be furnished at that time. (Applause)
THE PRESIDENT: Dr.
Kennelly has referred to the struggles of the past, and we are very
fortunate in having with us to-night one who was associated with Mr.
Tesla in his struggles of the past. Gentlemen, I want to introduce to
you Mr. Charles A. Terry, who will tell us something about these
struggles and the early work of Mr. Tesla, for which we assign to him
the Medal to-night.
CHARLES A. TERRY: Mr.
Kennelly spoke of the thousandth award of the Medal. I think there is a
peculiar significance in the fact that Mr. Tesla is to receive the
seventh medal—the seventh in most calculations is considered a most
excellent number to have.
The convolutions of the
brain of one man impel him to paint upon canvas the visions of his soul;
another conceives beauty of form which he must express in plastic art or
in architectural structure; others are driven by an inner force to
devote their lives to the discovery of the secrets of unexplored regions
of the earth, or to search out the mysteries of the stars; some find
themselves compelled by an irresistible desire to learn through
archeological research the forgotten achievements of ancient races;
still others seek to ascertain and formulate the physical laws which
govern the processes of nature, and men with other talents find
themselves urged by a like persistent force to devise and disclose new
means whereby those laws may be utilized for the further benefit of
mankind.
It is this God-given
desire to accomplish and to give, that has produced the Michelangelos,
the Galileos, the Sir Christopher Wrens, the Livingstons, Newtons,
Franklins, Westinghouses, Edisons and scores of other makers of history;
men whose names we retain in affectionate remembrance, because they
earnestly responded to the call from within and by patient toil
conceived thoughts and discovered things of value which they promulgated
for the benefit of their fellow men.
Although hope of reward
may and properly should exist as an added impulse to such endeavors, the
chiefly effective force compelling to the long hours of hard work and
personal sacrifices of such men is the "I must" which speaks from within
the soul, and with our truly great men the desire for reward is better
satisfied by a consciousness of achieving their aims and by the just
commendation of their fellows than by material gain, except insofar as
the latter may aid in the further advancement of their tasks.
Fortunately, men
generally are not jealous nor envious of the doers of great deeds and
the givers of large benefits, but from the depths of their hearts are
grateful and they are satisfied only when evidence of their gratitude
can be brought home to the giver.
It is because of this
desire to show gratitude to, and appreciation of, one of our fellow
members, whose name history will rightly record in the same
distinguished class with those we have mentioned that we are gathered
to-night.
Twenty-nine years ago
this month, there was presented before this Institute, a paper of
unusual import. It is entitled "A New System of Alternate Current
Motors and Transformers". The author, Nikola Tesla, was then only 31
years of age, and but four years a resident of this country. His early
life was spent near his birthplace not far from the Eastern Adriatic
Coast. His father a Greek Clergyman and his mother, herself of an
inventive mind, secured for their young son a comprehensive training in
mathematics, physics and philosophy. At the age of 22 he had completed
his studies in engineering at the Polytechnic School in Gratz and also a
course in the University of Prague; and in 1881 began his practical work
at Budapest. In 1883 he was located in Strasbourg, engaged in
completing the lighting of a newly erected railway station. Shortly
after finishing this task he came to the United States. Mr. Tesla's
first work in this country was upon new designs of direct current arc
and incandescent lighting systems for the Edison Company.
Throughout all these
years his desire had been to find an opportunity to demonstrate the
truth of a conviction which became fixed in his mind while studying
direct current motors in school at Gratz in 1878; the conviction was
that it should be possible to create a rotating magnetic field without
the use of commutators. While at Strasbourg, Tesla had succeeded in
producing the rotation of a pivoted iron disc placed in a coil traversed
by alternating currents, a steel bar being projected into the coil in
the neighborhood of the disc. His conception of the reason for this
rotation at that time was that a lag occurred in the subsidence of the
magnetism of both the disc and the steel bar between successive current
waves, and that the mutual repulsions caused the disc to revolve. By
some fortunate process of reasoning he conceived while in Budapest (in
1882) that by using two or more out-of-phase alternating currents
respectively passing through geometrically displaced coils it would be
possible to develop his long sought progressively shifting magnetic
field.
Lack of funds and
facilities for working out his theory compelled still further
postponement, but in 1885 Tesla had the good fortune to interest men of
means in a direct current arc light which he had devised, and
subsequently a laboratory was equipped for him in Liberty Street, New
York, and here at last he found opportunity to demonstrate the
correctness of his long cherished theory. In 1887 he was able to
exhibit to his business associates and to Professor William A. Anthony,
whose expert opinion they sought, motors having such progressively
shifting fields without the use of commutators, as he had foreseen nine
years before.
Having thus
demonstrated the correctness of his theory and the feasibility of its
application, it remained for Tesla to work out various practical methods
of applying the principle, and the rapidity and wonderful way in which
he surrounded the entire field of constant speed, synchronous, induction
and split-phase motors is beautifully set forth in his paper of May
18th, and in the numerous patents issued May 1st, 1888, and succeeding
years, covering the forms of electric motors which have since become the
almost universal means for transforming the energy of alternating
currents into mechanical energy.
It is somewhat
difficult to eliminate from our minds the developments of the past
thirty years which have now become every day features of the electrical
industry, and to realize the meagreness of the then existing knowledge
of alternating current phenomena. The commercial use of alternating
current systems of distributions was then scarcely two years old. The
Gaulard & Gibbs system of series transformers had been used abroad in a
limited way for a slightly longer period but the multiple arc system
based upon the so-called "Stanley Rule" which initiated the great
development of the present system, was not put in practical operation in
the pioneer Great Barrington plant until March 1886. It was then
recognized that while the alternating -current possessed wonderful
possibilities for electrical distribution for lighting purposes, two
almost necessary devices were lacking to render it a complete success,
one a meter, the other a power motor. Professor Elihu Thomson promptly
devised a successful form of meter, the motive portion of which
comprised a laminated field and armature, the coils of the latter being
periodically close-circuited during revolution by a commutator. To fill
the demand for a power motor, however, the most promising device then
suggested was a series commutator motor with laminated field and
armature cores, but no satisfactory results had been obtained. Such was
the situation when Tesla's achievement was announced in the Institute
paper to which reference has been made.
His Honor Judge
Townsend of the United States Circuit Court, in an opinion rendered in
August, 1900, as the outgrowth of some patent litigation on the Tesla
inventions, concisely defines the underlying characteristic of the Tesla
motor as follows:
"Tesla's invention, considered in it
essence, was the production of a continuously rotating or whirling field
of magnetic forces for power purposes by generating two or more
displaced or differing phases of the alternating current, transmitting
such phases, with their independence preserved, to the motor, and
utilizing the displaced phases as such in the motor."
Among the first to
recognize the immense importance of Mr. Tesla's motors were Mr.
Westinghouse and his advisors, Mr. T. B. Kerr, Mr. Byllesby, Mr.
Shallenberger and Mr. Schmid, and in June Mr. Westinghouse secured an
option which shortly resulted in the purchase of the patents, thus
bringing under one ownership the alternating current transformer system
of distribution, and the Tesla motor. It is interesting to here note
that Mr. Shallenberger had about two weeks before the publication of the
Tesla patents independently devised an alternating current meter, the
principle of operation of which was that of the Tesla motor, and
whatever might have been Mr. Shallenberger's natural disappointment upon
finding himself thus anticipated, he at once recognized that to Mr.
Tesla belonged the honor of being the first to solve the great
fundamental problem of an alternating current motor. A warm friendship
between these two men began at once and continued throughout Mr.
Shallenberger's life, and Mr. Tesla rejoiced to accord to Mr.
Shallenberger full credit for the latter's brilliant work in producing
what is now the standard meter for alternating currents.
As illustrating the
generous gentleness of Tesla's character, I wish to here quote from
testimony given by him in 1903. Referring to Shallenberger, Tesla said:
"I clearly remember that in the first days
when I came to Pittsburgh he took me to lunch at the Duquesne Hotel, and
when I told him that I was sorry that I had anticipated him, I saw tears
in his eyes. That incident I remember vividly; but what has
preceded it I cannot remember now. Perhaps it is because this
impression was so vivid that it has destroyed the preceding ones, which
were weaker."
It is characteristic of
Tesla that he should so deeply regret the disappointments of another.
Owing in a measure to
the circumstance that the then prevailing rate of alternation of the
alternating current system was 16,000, the commercial introduction of
Tesla motors was somewhat retarded during the first few years, that rate
being found less adapted to the motor work than a lower rate. Today,
however, wherever alternating current systems are used Tesla motors
abound. Without such motors the alternating current system would have
remained seriously restricted in its use.
Before passing to a
consideration of other of Tesla's activities, it will be appropriate to
refer again to the opinion of Judge Townsend, from which I quote the
following:
"The Tesla discovery for which these patents
were granted revolutionized the art of electrical power transmission, as
well demonstrated in the record from both judicial and scientific
standpoints."
In the closing passage
of the opinion, Judge Townsend pays further tribute to Tesla in the
following words:
"It remained to the
genius of Tesla to capture the unruly, unrestrained, and hitherto
opposing elements in the field of nature and art and to harness them to
draw the machines of man. It was he who first showed how to transform
the toy of Arago into an engine of power, the "Laboratory experiment" of Baily into a practically successful motor, the indicator into a driver.
He first conceived the idea that the very impediments of reversal in
direction, the contradictions of alternations, might be transformed into
power-producing rotation, a whirling field of force.
What others looked upon as only invincible
barriers, impassable currents, and contradictory forces, he brought
under control and by harmonizing their directions taught how to utilize
in practical motors in distant cities the power of Niagara."
Imagination developed
to a high degree is a marked characteristic of all great inventors, so
it is of our great poets, artists, philosophers, generals, and, in fact,
of all great originators of thought and motion. The power to picture in
the mind things not yet existent is an underlying characteristic of most
great men. But imagination to be effective must be combined with a just
sense of proportion, a logical appreciation of limitations, and a
capacity for unremitting application. Mr. Tesla combines these
qualities in a marked degree, and particularly does he possess the
faculty of projecting his thought far into unexplored regions, not only
of science but of philosophy. His passion for searching out the
ultimate is charmingly evidenced by the following extract from his
lecture before this Institute at Columbia College, May 20th, 1891;
"In how far we can
understand the world around us is the ultimate thought of every student
of nature. The coarseness of our senses prevents us from recognizing
the ulterior construction of matter, and astronomy, this grandest and
most positive of natural sciences, can only teach us something that
happens, as it were, in our immediate neighborhood; of the remoter
portions of the boundless universe, with its numberless stars and suns,
we know nothing. But far beyond the limit of perception of our senses
the spirit still can guide us, and so we may hope that even these
unknown worlds—infinitely small and great—may in a measure become known
to us. Still, even if this knowledge should reach us, the searching
mind will find a barrier, perhaps forever unsurpassable, to the true
recognition of that which seems to be, the mere appearance of which is
the only and slender basis of all our philosophy.
Of all the forms of nature's immeasurable,
all-pervading energy, which, ever and ever changing and moving, like a
soul animates the inert universe, those of electricity and magnetism are
perhaps the most fascinating."
The impress made upon
the world by the deeds of a great inventor cannot be measured by the
number of patents which he has received nor by the monetary reward
secured nor by the mere exploitation of his name. Often his greatest
gifts are in the form of inspiring contributions to the literature,
filled with suggestions of lines of thought which lead others to work in
untried fields. This is especially true of a series of lectures
delivered by Mr. Tesla upon the subject of high frequency, high
potential currents. The first of the series was given at Columbia
College in 1891, before this Institute. During 1892 and 1893 this
lecture with additional data and experiments was repeated in London,
Paris, Philadelphia and St. Louis.
Referring to an
interesting interview with Mr. Tesla appearing in a New York daily in
1893 regarding the St. Louis lecture the Editor of the Electrical World
says:
"Mr. Tesla, in his own graceful way, tells
the story of his life and the history of some of his more important
inventions. Perhaps there is no living scientist in whose life and
work the general public takes a deeper interest, especially in this
country."
Tesla's fundamental
purpose was to publish the results of an extended research and of a
series of experiments patiently conducted at his laboratory and
elsewhere through many years. During these lectures he exhibited to the
audience numerous experiments displaying striking and instructive
phenomena. He also described many novel pieces of apparatus such, for
instance, as his high-frequency generator and induction coils and his
magnetically quenched arc. Mr. Erskine Murray in his treatise upon
Wireless Telegraphy, referring to certain of these early inventions of
Tesla says:
"Among many other
inventions, made as early as 1893, perhaps the most important to
wireless telegraphists is his method of producing long trains of waves
of high frequency, and of transforming them to higher voltage. After
several unsuccessful attempts he completed an alternator which could be
run at 30,000 periods per second, and designed a form of transformer
capable of transforming these currents to very high voltage. He also
showed that his transformer, or "Tesla coil" as it is usually called
nowadays, could transform currents of much higher frequencies than were
obtainable from his alternator, even currents of 100,000 or 1,000,000
periods per second, such as are produced by the oscillatory discharge of
a Leyden jar."
The London lecture was
given under the auspices of the British Institution of Electrical
Engineers and because of the intense public interest manifested after
its announcement the ample capacity of the Theatre of the Royal
Institution was required to accommodate the audience.
At the completion of
the lecture Prof. Aytron spoke as follows:
"It is my most pleasing duty to propose a
very hearty vote of thanks to our lecturer, who has entertained us, it
is true, for two hours, but we would willingly wait for another hour's
similar entertainment."
Mr. Fleming in his
authoritative book on wireless telegraphy and telephony pays the
following tribute:
''In 1892 Nikola Tesla
captured the attention of the whole scientific world by his fascinating
experiments on high frequency electric currents. He stimulated the
scientific imagination of others as well as displayed his own, and
created a widespread interest in his brilliant demonstrations.
Amongst those who witnessed these things no
one was more able to appreciate their inner meaning than Sir William
Crookes."
An article by E.
Raverot appearing in the Electrical World of March 26, 1892, closes a
review of the Tesla Paris lecture with the following appreciative
comment:
"One sees from this lecture the deep
interest which the works and discoveries of Mr. Tesla have inspired
among physicists since the first appearance of his publication, and it
is with great satisfaction that we are able to express the feeling of
admiration which his experiments have inspired in us."
In his London lecture
delivered in February, 1892, Tesla had occasion to describe a special
construction of insulated cable designed to guard against electro-static
disturbances, but immediately added the following significant
prediction:
"But such cables will
not be constructed, for before long intelligence—transmitted without wires—will
throb through the earth like a pulse through a living organism.
The wonder is that, with the present state of knowledge and experiences
gained, no attempt is being made to disturb the electrostatic or
magnetic condition of the earth and transmit, if nothing else,
intelligence."
This was Tesla's prophecy twenty-five years ago.
In his lecture before
the National Electric Light Association at St. Louis in March, 1893,
Mr. Tesla elaborated certain views regarding the importance of resonance
effects in this field and stated:
"I would say a few words on a subject which
constantly fills my thoughts and which concerns the welfare of all.
I mean the transmission of intelligible signals or perhaps even power to
any distance without the use of wires."
He then announced that
his conviction had grown so strong that he no longer looked upon the
plan of transmitting intelligence as a mere theoretical possibility, and
referring to the existing belief of some that telephony to any distance
might be accomplished "by induction through the air", concisely set
forth his theory as follows:
"I cannot stretch my imagination so far, but
I do firmly believe that it is practical to disturb by means of powerful
machines the electro-static condition of the earth and thus transmit
intelligible signals and perhaps power."
Enlarging upon this
theory, he states that, although we have no possible evidence of a
charged body existing in space without other oppositely electrified
bodies being near, there is a fair probability that the earth is such a
body, for by whatever process it was separated from other bodies it must
have retained a charge and that the upper strata of the air may be
conducting and contain this opposite charge. He further expanded the
theory that with proper means for producing electrical oscillations it
might be possible to produce electrical disturbances sufficiently
powerful to be perceptible by suitable instruments at any point on the
Earth's surface. He thus forecast the theory at present accepted by
leading scientists as the true basis of wireless telegraphy.
Continuing the same
line of thought Mr. Tesla in an interview which appeared in the New York
Herald in 1393 said:
"One result of my
investigations, the possibility of which has been proven by experiment,
is the transmission of energy through the air. I advanced that idea
some time ago, and I am happy to say it is now receiving some attention
from scientific men.
The plan I have suggested is to disturb by
powerful machinery the electricity of the earth, thus setting it in
vibration. Proper appliances will be constructed to take up the
energy transmitted by these vibrations, transforming them into suitable
form of power to be made available for the practical wants of life."
Testifying in a patent
suit regarding these early predictions Mr. John Stone Stone, the
well-known authority on wireless telegraphy has but recently made the
following striking comment:
"I misunderstood
Tesla. I think we all misunderstood Tesla. We thought he was a dreamer
and visionary. He did dream and his dreams came true, he did have
visions but they were of a real future, not an imaginary one. Tesla was
the first man to lift his eyes high enough to see that the rarified
stratum of atmosphere above our earth was destined to play an important
role in the radio telegraphy of the future, a fact which had to obtrude
itself on the attention of most of us before we saw it. But
Tesla also perceived what many of us did not
in those days, namely, the currents which flowed away from the base of
the antenna over the surface of the earth and in the earth itself."
Seldom is it that an
art springs into being through the efforts of one man alone, but rather
as a growth to which many have contributed. This is peculiarly true of
the wireless art, and without detracting in the slightest from the honor
which is justly due to those who have brought the system to its present
wonderful efficiency, it is just to accord to Tesla highest praise not
alone for his exposition of principles as set forth in his lectures but
also for the more definitive work which followed, much of which is
evidenced by his many patents dealing with the wireless art.
Before leaving this
branch of Tesla's work, I wish to quote again from the testimony of Mr.
Stone, presenting his view of the indebtedness of the wireless art to
Tesla:
"Some of those whose
work or whose writings during that early period must be noted are Nikola
Tesla, Prof. Elihu Thomson, Prof. M. I. Pupin, Prof. Lodge, Prof.
Northrup, Prof. Pierce, Hutin & Leblanc, Mr. Marconi and myself.
Among all these, the name of Nikola Tesla stands out most prominently.
Tesla, with his almost preternatural insight into alternating current
phenomena that had enabled him some years before to revolutionize the
art of electric power transmission through the invention of the rotary
field motor, knew how to make resonance serve, not merely the role of
microscope to make visible the electric oscillations, as Hertz had done,
but he made it serve the role of a stereopticon to render spectacular to
large audiences the phenomena of electric oscillations and high
frequency currents. He did more to excite interest and create an
intelligent understanding of these phenomena in the years 1891-92-93
than any one else, and the more we learn about high frequency phenomena,
resonance and radiation today, the nearer we find ourselves approaching
what we at one time were inclined, through a species of intellectual
myopia, to regard as the fascinating but fantastical speculations of a
man who we are now compelled, in the light of modern experience and
knowledge, to admit was a prophet. He saw to the fulfillment of
his prophesies and it has been difficult to make any but unimportant
improvements in the art of radio-telegraph without traveling part of the
way at least, along a trail blazed by this pioneer who, though eminently
ingenious, practical and successful in the apparatus he devised and
constructed, was so far ahead of his time that the best of us then
mistook him for a dreamer."
Another well recognized
wireless authority, Professor Slaby in a personal letter to Tesla took
occasion to say:
"I am devoting myself since some time to
investigations in wireless telegraph, which you have first founded in
such a clear and precise manner. It will interest you, as father
of this telegraph, to know, etc."
Throughout Tesla's work
with high potential currents he had persistently in mind the wireless
transmission of power in large quantities. It was in the furtherance of
this line of investigation that he expended large amounts of money and
years of labor at Wardenclyffe, Long Island, and at Telluride,
Colorado. Late in 1914 he secured a patent upon an application filed
twelve years before upon an apparatus for transmitting electric energy
with which he hopes to be able to transmit unlimited power with high
economy to any distance without wires. While as yet these efforts have
not resulted in commercial exploitation, the future may prove that his
dream of thus transmitting energy in substantial amounts is of that
class which in time come true, as in the case of his dream of wireless
telegraphy.
Another use to which
Tesla adapted the results of his high frequency investigations was the
control of the movements of torpedoes and boats. In 1898 he patented
such an apparatus and also built and successfully operated such a
craft. The movements of the propelling engine, the steering and other
mechanisms were controlled wirelessly from the shore or other point
through a distance of two miles. Apparently this, like some of his
other inventions, was ahead of its time. Tesla, however, evidenced his
entire faith in the future of the apparatus in an interview which
appeared in 1898 from which I quote:
"But I have no desire
that my fame should rest on the invention of a merely destructive
device, no matter how terrible. I prefer to be remembered as the
inventor who succeeded in abolishing war. That will be my highest
pride. But there are many peaceful uses to which my invention can be
put, conspicuously that of rescuing the shipwrecked.
It will be perfectly feasible to equip our
lifesaving stations with life cars, or boats, directed and controlled
from the shores, which will approach stranded vessels and bring off the
passengers and crews without risking the lives of the brave fellows who
are now forced to fight their way to the rescue through the raging surf.
It may also be used for the propulsion of pilot boats, for carrying
letters or provisions or instruments to inaccessible regions."
On March 12th, 1895,
Mr. Tesla met with a disastrous loss by the destruction of his
laboratory at 33 and 35 South 5th Avenue, New York. In the Electrical
Review of March 20th, 1895, there is published an interview with Mr.
Tesla regarding this fire. In it he says:
"I am congratulating myself all the time it
is no worse. I begin all over again, but I have the knowledge and
experience of what has gone before, and fortunately I was able to show
with completed apparatus that my ideas and theories are correct.
Had the fire occurred a few months ago I should have been robbed of the
opportunity of many highly successful demonstrations."
In his laboratory were
stored a vast quantity of old models and trial apparatus with which he
would have been unwilling to part for any amount of money. He further
states that he was at the time engaged upon four main lines of work and
investigation: his oscillator, and improved method of electric lighting,
the transmission of intelligence without wires, and, an investigation
relating to the nature of electricity. Mr. Tesla deeply appreciated the
expressions of sympathy received from his many friends and with unabated
zeal applied himself to a continuation of the work thus unfortunately
interrupted.
Another field of
investigation in which Mr. Tesla has contributed valuable material is
related to the Roentgen Ray. In the Electrical Review of March and
April, 1896, there appeared a number of communications from Mr. Tesla
which while giving full credit to Roentgen for his magnificent discovery
made public much additional data derived from his own careful
experiments in this line of research. From an editorial in the
Electrical Review of March 18th, 1896, the following is quoted:
"The announcement of Nikola Tesla's
achievements in the new art first published in the Electrical Review of
March 11th, in the author's own modest language has added fresh impetus
to the work in this direction. His disruptive discharge coil has
been universally used where the best results in radiography have been
obtained, and his two marked improvements, namely, the single electrode
tube and his method of rarefaction, promise great results. Other
important points about Tesla's work are the fine details he has obtained
in his radiographs, the great distance at which the radiographs have
been made, and brief time of exposure."
And again:
"Mr. Tesla is pursuing quietly his work and
giving all credit to Roentgen; and it is significant, we think, that the
first radiograph he produced in his laboratory was the name of the
discoverer. We wish that such courtesies among scientists would
always be practiced."
Mr. J. Mount Bleyer
commenting upon these investigations said:
"The results obtained by Tesla are simply
marvelous, but are just what I expected."
Among the many other
inventions to which Mr. Tesla has devoted much time and energy may be
mentioned a thermo-magnetic motor and a pyro-magnetic generator,
anti-sparking dynamo brush and commutator, auxiliary brush regulation of
direct current dynamos, uni-polar dynamos, mechanical and electrical
oscillators, electro-therapeutic apparatus, the oxidation of nitrogen by
high frequency currents, and an electrolytic registering meter. The
last named device was based upon an exceedingly interesting theory. The
current to be measured was passed through two parallel conductors
arranged in series. The current established a difference of potential
between these conductors proportional to the strength of the current
passing. This results in a transference of the metal from one conductor
to the other, thereby decreasing the resistance of one and increasing
that of the other. From such variations in resistance of one or both,
the current energy expended is computed.
One other line of
endeavor entirely outside of electricity to which Tesla has given much
attention is the development of a bladeless steam turbine in which the
friction of the passing steam as distinguished from its direct impact is
availed of. The steam is admitted between plain parallel rotating discs
and passing spirally from the circumference toward the axial center
imparts energy to the discs. Such a turbine can be run at exceedingly
high temperatures, is readily reversible and having no blades is
extremely simple and free from liability to accidental derangement.
With great ingenuity Tesla has succeeded in producing such machines of
considerable power and having exceedingly interesting characteristics.
It is to be hoped that with his indefatigable zeal Tesla will soon
succeed in perfecting the commercial application of this invention.
It is not possible in
this brief survey even to touch upon many of the lines of Mr. Tesla's
activities, but we must content ourselves with this inadequate
presentation of typical evidences of the fascinating genius of this man
whom we delight to welcome as a citizen of our country—the country which
he twenty-five years ago adopted as his own—the country of which he once
said:
"When I arrived upon your hospitable shores
I eagerly applied myself to work and to learn, and I have persevered in
that course. If I have made any special success in this country, I
attribute it largely to a feature which is characteristic of both the
English and American races; that is, their keen and generous
appreciation of any work that they think is good."
Mr. Tesla, we would
indeed be woefully lacking in the attributes which you so kindly ascribe
to us were we not most cordially appreciative of your work, work which
we know is good.
THE PRESIDENT:
Gentlemen, we are fortunate in having with us to-night another man who
has been familiar with Mr. Tesla's work for many years and can tell us
something further about his work. I introduce Mr. B. A. Behrend.
B. A. BEHREND: Mr.
Chairman: Mr. President of the American Institute of Electrical
Engineers: Fellow Members: Ladies and Gentlemen:
BY AN EXTRAORDINARY
COINCIDENCE, it is exactly twenty-nine years ago, to the very day and
hour, that there stood before this Institute Mr. Nikola Tesla, and he
read the following sentences:
"To obtain a rotary
effort in these motors was the subject of long thought. In order to
secure this result it was necessary to make such a disposition that
while the poles of one element of the motor are shifted by the alternate
currents of the source, the poles produced upon the other elements
should always be maintained in the proper relation to the former,
irrespective of the speed of the motor. Such a condition exists in a
continuous current motor; but in a synchronous motor, such as described,
the condition is fulfilled only when the speed is normal.
"The object has been attained by placing within the ring properly
subdivided cylindrical iron core wound with several independent coils
closed upon themselves. Two coils at right angles are sufficient, but a
greater number may be advantageously employed. It results from this
disposition that when the poles of the ring are shifted, currents are
generated in the closed armature coils. These currents are the most
intense at or near the points of the greatest density of the lines of
force, and their effect is to produce poles upon the armature at right
angles to those of the ring, at least theoretically so; and since this
action is entirely independent of the speed—that is, as far as the
location of the poles is concerned—a continuous pull is exerted upon the
periphery of the armature. In many respects these motors are similar to
the continuous current motors. If load is put on, the speed, and also
the resistance of the motor, is diminished and more current is made to
pass through the energizing coils, thus increasing the effort. Upon the
load being taken off, the counter-electromotive force increases and less
current passes through the primary or energizing coils. Without any
load the speed is very nearly equal to that of the shifting poles of the
field magnet.
"It will be found that the rotary effort in
these motors fully equals that of the continuous current motors.
The effort seems to be greatest when both armature and field magnets are
without any projections."
Not since the
appearance of Faraday's Experimental Researches in Electricity has a
great experimental truth been voiced so simply and so clearly as this
description of Mr. Tesla's great discovery of the generation and
utilization of polyphase alternating currents. He left nothing to be
done for those who followed him. His paper contained the skeleton even
of the mathematical theory.
Three years later, in
1891, there was given the first great demonstration, by Swiss engineers,
of the transmission of power at 30,000 volts from Aauffen to Frankfort
by means of Mr. Tesla's system. A few years later this was followed by
the development of the Cataract Construction Company, under the
presidency of our member, Mr. Edward D. Adams, and with the aid of the
engineers of the Westinghouse Company. It is interesting to recall here
to-night that in Lord Kelvin's report to Mr. Adams, Lord Kelvin
recommended the use of direct current for the development of power at
Niagara Falls and for the transmission to Buffalo.
The due appreciation or
even enumeration of the results of Mr. Tesla's invention is neither
practicable nor desirable at this moment. There is a time for all
things. Suffice it to say that, were we to seize and to eliminate from
our industrial world the results of Mr. Tesla's work, the wheels of
industry would cease to turn, our electric cars and trains would stop,
our towns would be dark, our mills would be dead and idle. Yea, so far
reaching is this work, that it has become the warp and woof of industry.
The basis for the
theory of the operating characteristics of Mr. Tesla's rotating field
induction motor, so necessary to its practical development, was laid by
the brilliant French savant, Prof. Andre Blondel, and by Prof. Kapp of
Birmingham. It fell to my lot to complete their work and to
coordinate,—by means of the simple ''circle diagram",—the somewhat
mysterious and complex experimental phenomena. As this was done
twenty-one years ago, it is particularly pleasing to me, upon the coming
of age of this now universally accepted theory,—tried out by application
to several million horse power of machines operating in our great
industries,—to pay my tribute to the inventor of the motor and the
system which have made possible the electric transmission of energy.
HIS name marks an epoch in the advance of electrical science. From THAT
work has sprung a revolution in the electrical art.
We asked Mr. Tesla to
accept this medal. We did not do this for the mere sake of conferring a
distinction, or of perpetuating a name; for so long as men occupy
themselves with our industry, his work will be incorporated in the
common thought of our art, and the name of Tesla runs no more risk of
oblivion than does that of Faraday, or that of Edison.
Nor indeed does this
Institute give this medal as evidence that Mr. Tesla's work has received
its official sanction. His work stands in no need of such sanction.
No, Mr. Tesla, we beg
you to cherish this medal as a symbol of our gratitude for the new
creative thought, the powerful impetus, akin to revolution, which you
have given to our art and to our science. You have lived to see the
work of your genius established. What shall a man desire more than
this? There rings out to us a paraphrase of Pope's lines on Newton:
Nature and Nature's
laws lay hid in night God said, 'Let Tesla be,' and all was light.
THE PRESIDENT: It is
easy, I think, for engineers and scientists to take for granted things
that have been done in years past. When we sit under an apple tree and
see the apples fall, it is an obvious phenomenon of nature. We can
understand the laws of gravitation, but to Sir Isaac Newton, many years
ago, this phenomenon, which to us to-day is so simple, helped him to an
act of creative imagination of the most extraordinary kind.
So, later on, the
phenomenon of electromagnetic induction, which to us to-day has become a
matter of second nature, to Faraday was an act of the most extraordinary
creative imagination.
Thirty years ago when
Mr. Tesla was doing his very great work, we sometimes forget the
conditions of electrical engineering which prevailed at that time.
Direct current or continuous current was universally used, and the
conceptions of electrical engineers with respect to electric currents
were all unidirectional, so to speak. We had not arrived at that
conception of currents which went first in one direction and then in
another, to say nothing of electrical currents which differed by phase
relations, and the work of Nikola Tesla at that time in his great
conception of the rotary field seems to me one of the greatest feats of
imagination which has ever been attained by human mind. To-day we take
the rotary field motor, the rotary field transmission, as a matter of
course, because we have become used to it, and we forget what it
required of the human intellect to create it thirty or thirty-five years
ago.
At the time the great
Niagara Falls enterprise was instituted, we were under the
direct-current regime. As Mr. Behrend says, such a great authority on
electrical engineering as Lord Kelvin, and also Mr. Edison, recommended
direct-current for transmission of energy from Niagara Falls to Buffalo,
and as a system for universal use in their great waterpower
development. I think we all realize to-day where we should be at the
present time if direct-current had been used in the development of that
enterprise. There would have been a radiating copper mine running out
from Niagara Falls which would have wrecked the enterprise in the first
year of its existence. Mr. Tesla came along with his great mind and at
the psychological moment devised the principle which made that
enterprise a success, and made hundreds of other enterprises all over
the world an equal success. We owe him the greatest possible debt of
gratitude for what he has done for electrical engineers.
And so again, in
another field of endeavor in which he was most conspicuous, that of high
voltage and high frequency alternating-current, he devised and
discovered phenomena which were entirely new to electrical engineers,
and he introduced to the world the conception of alternating-current as
being elastic or oscillating media. The direct-current engineers at the
time never thought of the electric current being something that could
oscillate, and Mr. Tesla showed it could, and he also showed many of the
phenomena which resulted from oscillating currents. From his work
followed the great work of Roentgen, who discovered the Roentgen rays,
and all that work which has been carried on throughout the world in the
following years by J. J. Thompson and others, which has really led to
the conception of modern physics. His work, as has been stated,
antedated that of Marconi and formed the basis of wireless telegraphy,
which is one of the most scientific applications of the present day, and
so on throughout all branches of science and engineering we find from
time to time some important evidence of what Tesla has contributed to
the sciences and engineering of the present day. So, Mr. Tesla, you
hear to-night the many compliments which have been paid to you, but they
are not bouquets merely cast for the adornment of the occasion -they
have been given with the sincere appreciation of the electrical
profession, and we give this medal to you in recognition of this, with
full appreciation of what you have done for us, and with great hope that
you may continue to contribute to our profession in the future. (Great
applause)
NIKOLA TESLA: Mr.
President, Ladies and Gentlemen. "I wish to thank you heartily for your
kind sympathy and appreciation. I am not deceiving myself in the fact,
of which you must be aware, that the speakers have greatly magnified my
modest achievements. One should in such a situation be neither
diffident nor self-assertive, and in that sense I will concede that some
measure of credit may be due to me for the first steps tin certain new
directions; but the ideas I advanced have triumphed, the forces and
elements have been conquered, and greatness achieved, through the
co-operation of many able men some of whom, I am glad to say, are
present this evening. Inventors, engineers, designers, manufacturers
and financiers have done their share until, as Mr. Behrend said, a
gigantic revolution has been wrought in the transmission and
transformation of energy. While we are elated over the results achieved
we are pressing on, inspired with the hope and conviction that this is
just a beginning, a forerunner of further and still greater
accomplishments.
On this occasion, you
might want me to say something of a personal and more intimate character
bearing on my work. One of the speakers suggested: "Tell us something
about yourself, about your early struggles." If I am not mistaken in
this surmise I will, with your approval, dwell briefly on this rather
delicate subject.
Some of you who have
been impressed by what has been said, and would be disposed to accord me
more than I have deserved, might be mystified and wonder how so much as
Mr. Terry has outlined could have been done by a man as manifestly young
as myself. Permit me to explain this. I do not speak often in public,
and wish to address just a few remarks directly to the members of my
profession, so that there will be no mistake in the future. In the
first place, I come from a very wiry and long-lived race. Some of my
ancestors have been centenarians, and one of them lived one hundred and
twenty-nine years. I am determined to keep up the record and please
myself with prospects of great promise. Then again, nature has given me
a vivid imagination which, through incessant exercise and training,
study of scientific subjects and verification of theories through
experiment, has become very accurate and precise, so that I have been
able to dispense, to a large extent, with the slow, laborious, wasteful
and expensive process of practical development of the ideas I conceive.
It has made it possible for me to explore extended fields with great
rapidity and get results with the least expenditure of vital energy. By
this means I have it in my power to picture the objects of my desires in
forms real and tangible and so rid myself of that morbid craving for
perishable possessions to which so many succumb. I may say, also, that
I am deeply religious at heart, although not in the orthodox meaning,
and that I give myself to the constant enjoyment of believing that the
greatest mysteries of our being are still to be fathomed and that, all
the evidence of the senses and the teachings of exact and dry sciences
to the contrary notwithstanding, death itself may not be the termination
of the wonderful metamorphosis we witness. In this way I have managed
to maintain an undisturbed peace of mind, to make myself proof against
adversity, and to achieve contentment and happiness to a point of
extracting some satisfaction even from the darker side of life, the
trials and tribulations of existence. I have fame and untold wealth,
more than this, and yet—how many articles have been written in which I
was declared to be an impractical unsuccessful man, and how many poor,
struggling writers, have called me a visionary. Such is the folly and
shortsightedness of the world!
Now that I have
explained why I have preferred my work to the attainment of worldly
rewards, I will touch upon a subject which will lend me to say something
of greater importance and enable me to explain how I invent and develop
ideas. But first I must say a few words regarding my life which was
most extraordinary and wonderful in its varied impressions and
incidents. In the first place, it was charmed. You have heard that one
of the provisions of the Edison Medal was that the recipient should be
alive. Of course the men who have received this medal have fully
deserved it, in that respect, because they were alive when it was
conferred upon them, but none has deserved it in anything like the
measure I do, when it comes to that feature. In my youth my ignorance
and lightheartedness brought me into innumerable difficulties, dangers
and scrapes, from which I extricated myself as by enchantment. That
occasioned my parents great concern more, perhaps, because I was the
last male than because I was of their own flesh and blood. You should
know that Serbians desperately cling to the preservation of the race. I
was nearly drowned a dozen times. I was almost cremated three or four
times and just missed being boiled alive. I was buried, abandoned and
frozen. I have had narrow escapes from mad dogs, hogs and other wild
animals. I have passed through dreadful diseases—have been given up by
physicians three or four times in my life for good. I have met with all
sorts of odd accidents—I cannot think of anything that did not happen to
me, and to realize that I am here this evening, hale and hearty, young
in mind and body, with all these fruitful years behind me, is little
short of a miracle.
But my life was
wonderful in another respect—in my capacity of inventor. Not so much,
perhaps, in concentrated mentality, or physical endurance and energy;
for these are common enough. If you inquire into the career of
successful men in the inventor's profession you will find, as a rule,
that they are as remarkable for their physical as for their mental
performance. I know that when I worked with Edison, after all of his
assistants had been exhausted, he said to me: "I never saw such a thing,
you take the cake." That was a characteristic way for him to express
what I did. We worked from half past ten in the morning until five
o'clock the next morning. I carried this on for nine months without a
single day's exception; everybody else gave up. Edison stuck, but he
occasionally dozed off on the table. What I wish to say particularly is
that my early life was really extraordinary in certain experiences which
led to everything I ever did afterwards. It is important that this
should be explained to you as otherwise you would not know how I
discovered the rotating field. From childhood I was afflicted in a
singular way—I would see images of objects and scenes with a strong
display of light and of much greater vividness than those I had observed
before. They were always images of objects and scenes I had actually
seen, never of such as I imagined. I have asked students of psychology,
physiology and other experts about it, but none of them has been able to
explain the phenomena which seems to have been unique, although I was
probably predisposed, because my brother also saw images in the same
way. My theory is that they were simply reflex actions from the brain
on the retina, superinduced by hyper-excitation of the nerves. You
might think that I had hallucinations. That is impossible. They are
produced only in diseased and anguished brains. My head was always
clear as a bell, and I had no fear. Do you want me to tell of my
recollections bearing on this? (Turning to the gentlemen on the
platform). This is traditional with me, for I was too young to remember
anything of what I said. I had two old aunts, I recall, with wrinkled
faces, one of them with two great protruding teeth which she used to
bury into my cheek when she kissed me. One day they asked me which of
the two was prettier. After looking them over I answered: "This one is
not as ugly as the other one." That was evidence of good sense. Now as
I told you, I had no fear. They used to ask me, "Are you afraid of
robbers?" and I would reply "No". "Of wolves?" "No". Then they would
ask, "Are you afraid of crazy Luka?" (A fellow who would tear through
the village and nothing could stop him) "No, I am not afraid of Luka." "Are you afraid of the gander?"
"Yes, I am," I would reply and cling to
my mother. That was because once they put me in the court yard with
nothing on, and that beast ran up and grabbed me by the soft part of the
stomach tearing off a piece of flesh. I still have the mark.
These images I saw
caused me considerable discomfort. I will give you and illustration:
Suppose I had witnessed a funeral. In my country the rites are but
intensified torture. They smother the dead body with kisses, then they
bathe it, expose it for three days, and finally one hears the dull thuds
of the earth, when all is over. Some of the pictures as that of the
coffin, for instance, would not appear vividly but were sometimes so
persistent that when I would stretch my hand out I would see it
penetrate the image. As I look at it now these images were simply
reflex actions through the optic nerve on the retina, producing on the
same an effect identical to that of a projection through the lens, and
if my view is correct, then it will be possible, (and certainly my
experience has demonstrated that), to project the image of any object
one conceives in thought on a screen and make it visible. If this could
be done it would revolutionize all human relations. I am convinced that
it can and will be accomplished.
In order to free myself
of these tormenting appearances, I tried to fix my mind on some other
picture or image which I had seen, and in this way I would manage to get
some relief; but in order to get this relief I had to let the images
come one after the other very fast. Then I found that I soon exhausted
all I had at my command, my "reel" was out, as it were. I had seen
little of the world, only objects around my own home, and they took me a
few times to some neighbors, that was all I knew. When I did so the
second or third time, in order to chase the appearance from my vision, I
found that this remedy lost all the force: Then I began to make
excursions beyond the limits of the little world I knew, and I saw new
scenes. These were at first very blurred and indistinct, and would flit
away when I tried to concentrate my attention upon them, but by and by I
succeeded in fixing them; they gained in force and distinctness and
finally assumed the intensity of real things. Soon I observed that my
best comfort was attained if I simply went on in my vision farther and
farther, getting new impressions all the time, and so I started to
travel—of course, in my mind. You know that there have been great
discoveries made—when Columbus found America that was one, but when I
hit upon the idea of traveling it seemed to me that was the greatest
discovery possible to man. Every night (and sometimes during the day),
as soon as I was alone I would start on my travels. I would see new
places, cities and countries, I would live there, meet people and make
friendships and acquaintances, and these were just as dear to me as
those in real life and not a bit less intense. That is the way I did
until I reached almost manhood. When I turned my thoughts to invention,
I found that I could visualize my conceptions with the greatest
facility. I did not need any models, drawings or experiments, I could
do it all in my mind, and I did. In this way I have unconsciously
evolved what I consider a new method of materializing inventive concepts
and ideas, which is exactly opposite to the purely experimental of which
undoubtedly Edison is the greatest and most successful exponent. The
moment you construct a device to carry into practice a crude idea you
will find yourself inevitably engrossed with the details and defects of
the apparatus. As you go on improving and reconstructing, your force of
concentration diminishes and you lose sight of the great underlying
principle. You obtain results, but at the sacrifice of quality. My
method is different, I do not rush into constructive work. When I get
an idea, I start right away to build it up in my mind. I change the
structure, I make improvements, I experiment, I run the device in my
mind. It is absolutely the same to me whether I operate my turbine in
thought or test it actually in my shop. It makes no difference, the
results are the same. In this way, you see, I can rapidly develop and
perfect an invention, without touching anything. When I have gone so
far that I have put into the device every possible improvement I can
think of, that I can see no fault anywhere, I then construct this final
product of my brain. Every time my device works as I conceive it should
and my experiment comes out exactly as I plan it. In twenty years there
has not been a single solitary experiment which did not turn out
precisely as I thought it would. Why should it not? Engineering,
electrical and mechanical, is positive in results. Almost any subject
presented can be mathematically treated and the effects calculated; but
if it is such that results cannot be had by simple methods of
mathematics or short cuts, there is all the experience, and all the data
on which to draw and from which to build;—why, then, should one carry
out the crude idea? It is not necessary, it is a waste of energy, money
and time. Now, that is just the way I produced the rotating field.
If I am to give you in
a few words the history of that invention, I must begin with my
birthday, and you will see the reason why. I was born exactly at
midnight, I have no birthday and I never celebrate it. But something
else must have happened on that date. I have learned that my heart beat
on the right side and did so for many years after. As I grew up it beat
on both sides, and finally settled on the left. I remember that I was
surprised, when I developed into a very strong man, to find my heart on
the left side. Nobody understands how it happened. I had two or three
falls and on one occasion nearly all my chest bones were crushed in.
Something that was quite unusual must have occurred at my birth and my
parents destined me for the clergy then and there. When I was six years
old I managed to have myself imprisoned in a little chapel at an
inaccessible mountain, and visited only once a year. It was a place of
many bloody encounters and there was a grave yard near by. I was locked
in there while looking for some sparrows' nests, and had the most
dreadful night I ever passed in my life, in company with the ghosts of
the dead. American boys will not understand it, of course, for there
are no ghosts in America—the people are too sensible; but my country was
full of them, and every one from the small boy to greatest hero, who was
plastered all over with medals for courage and bravery, had a fear of
ghosts. Finally, as by a wonder, they rescued me, and then my parents
said: "Surely he must go to the clergy, he must become a churchman."
Whatever happened after that, no matter what it was, simply fortified
them in that resolution. One day, to tell you a little story, I fell
from the top of one of the farm buildings into a large kettle of milk,
which was boiling over a roaring fire. Did I say boiling milk? "It was
not boiling—not according to the thermometer—though I would have sworn
it was when I fell into it, and they pulled me out. But I only got a
blister on the knee where I struck the hot kettle. My parents said
again: "Was not that wonderful? Did you ever hear of such a thing? He
will surely be a bishop, a metropolitan, perhaps a patriarch." In my
eighteenth year I came to the cross roads. I had passed through the
preliminary schools and had to make up my mind either to embrace the
clergy or to run away. I had a profound respect for my parents, and so
I resigned myself to take up studies for the clergy. Just then one
thing occurred, and if it had not been for that, I would not have had my
name connected with the occasion of this evening. A tremendous epidemic
of cholera broke out, which decimated the population and, of course, I
got immediately. Later it developed into dropsy, pulmonary trouble, and
all sorts of diseases until finally my coffin was ordered. In one of
the fainting spells when they thought I was dying, my father came to my
bedside and cheered me: "You are going to get well." "Perhaps," I
replied, "if you will let me study engineering." "Certainly I will," he
assured me, "you will go to the best polytechnic school in Europe." I
recovered to the amazement of everybody. My father kept his word, and
after a year of roaming through the mountains and getting myself in good
physical shape, I went to the Polytechnic School at Gratz, Styria, one
of the oldest institutions. Something else occurred, however, of which
I must tell you as it is vitally linked with this discovery. In the
preparatory schools there was no liberty in the choice of subjects, and
unless a student was proficient in all of them he could not pass. I
found myself in this predicament every year. I could not draw. My
faculty for imagining things paralyzed whatever gift I might have had in
this respect. I have made some mechanical drawings, of course;
practicing so many years one must needs learn to make simple sketches,
but if I draw for half an hour I am all exhausted. I never was
qualified and passed only through my father's influence. Now, when I
went to the polytechnic school I had free choice of subjects and
proposed myself to show my parents what I could do. The first year at
the polytechnic school was spent in this way—I got up at three o'clock
in the morning and worked until eleven o'clock at night, for one whole
year, with a single day's exception. Well, you know when a man with a
reasonably healthy brain works that way he must accomplish something.
Naturally, I did. I graduated nine times that year and some of the
professors were not satisfied with giving me the highest distinction,
because they said, that did not express their idea of what I did, and
here is where I come to the rotating field. In addition to the regular
graduating papers they gave me some certificates which I brought to my
father believing that I had achieved a great triumph. He took the
certificates and threw them into the waste basket, remarking
contemptuously: "I know how these testimonials are obtained." That
almost killed my ambition; but later, after my father had died, I was
mortified to find a package of letters, from which I could see that
there had been considerable correspondence going on between him and the
professors who had written to the effect that unless he took me away
from school I would kill myself with work. Then I understood why he had
slighted my success, which I was told was greater than any previous one
at that institution; in fact the best students had only graduated
twice. My record in the first year had the result that the professors
became very much interested in and attached to me, particularly three of
them; Prof. Rogner who was teaching arithmetical subjects and geometry;
Prof. Alle, one of the most brilliant and wonderful lecturers I have
ever seen, who specialized in differential equations, about which he
wrote quite a number of works in German, and Prof. Poeschl, who was my
instructor in physics. These three men were simply in love with me and
used to give me problems to solve. Prof. Poeschl was a curious man. I
never saw such feet in my life. They were about that size.
(Indicating) His hands were like paws, but when he performed experiments
they were so convincing and the whole went off so beautifully that one
never realized how they were done. It was all in the method. He did
all with the precision of a clock work, and everything succeeded.
It was in the second
year of my studies that we received a Gramme machine from Paris, having
a horse-shoe form of laminated magnet, and a wound armature with a
commutator. We connected it up and showed various effects of currents.
During the time Prof. Poeschl was making demonstrations running the
machine as a motor we had some trouble with the brushes. They sparked
very badly, and I observed: "Why should not we operate without the
brushes?" Prof. Poeschl declared that it could not be done, and in view
of my success in the past year he did me the honor of delivering a
lecture touching on the subject. He remarked: "Mr. Tesla may accomplish
great things, but he certainly never will do this," and he reasoned that
it would be equivalent to converting a steadily pulling force, like that
of gravity, into a rotary effort, a sort of perpetual motion scheme, an
impossible idea. But you know that instinct is something which
transcends knowledge. We have, undoubtedly, certain finer fibers that
enable us to perceive truths when logical deduction, or any other
willful effort of the brain, is futile. We cannot reach beyond certain
limits in our reasoning, but with instinct we can go to very great
lengths. I was convinced that I was right and that it was possible. It
was not a perpetual motion idea, it could be done, and I started to work
at once.
I will not tire you
with an extended account of this undertaking, but will only say that I
began in the summer of 1877 and I proceeded as follows: I would picture
first of all, a direct-current machine, run it and see how the currents
changed in the armature. Then I would imagine an alternator and do the
same thing. Next I would visualize systems comprising motors and
generators, and so on. Whatever apparatus I imagined, I would put
together and operate in my mind, and I continued this practice
incessantly until 1882. In that year somehow or other, I began to feel
that a revelation was near. I could not yet see just exactly how to do
it, but I knew that I was approaching the solution. While on my
vacation, in 1882, sure enough, the idea came to me and I will never
forget the moment. I was walking with a friend of mine in the city park
of Budapest reciting passages from Faust. It was nothing for me to read
from memory the contents of an entire book, with every word between the
covers, from the first to the last. My sister and brother, however,
could do much better than myself. I would like to know whether any of
you has that kind of memory. It is curious, entirely visual and
retroactive. To be explicit—when I made my examens, I had always to
read the books three or four days if not a week before, because in that
time I could reconstruct the images and visualize them; but if I had an
examination the next day after reading, images were not clear and the
remembrance was not quite complete. As I say, I was reciting Goethe's
poem, and just as the sun was setting I felt wonderfully elated, and the
idea came to me like a flash. I saw the whole machinery clearly, the
generator, the motor, the connections, I saw it work as if it had been
real. With a stick I drew on the sand the diagrams which were shown in
my paper before the American Institute of Electrical Engineers and
illustrated in my patents, as clearly as possible, and from that time on
I carried this image in my mind. Had I been a man possessed of the
practical gifts of Edison, I would have gone right away to perform an
experiment and push the invention along, but I did not have to do this.
I could see pictures so vividly, and what I imagined was so real and
palpable, that I did not need any experimenting, nor would it have been
particularly interesting to me. I went on and improved the plan
continuously, inventing new types, and the day I came to America,
practically every form, every kind of construction, every arrangement of
apparatus I described in my thirty or forty patents was perfected,
except just two or three kinds of motors which were the result of later
development.
In 1883, I made some
tests in Strasburg, as Mr. Terry pointed out, and there at the railroad
station obtained the first rotation. The same experiment was repeated
twice.
Now I come to an
interesting chapter of my life, when I arrived in America. I had made
some improvements in dynamos for a French company who were getting their
machinery from here. The improved forms were so much better that the
manager of the works said to me: "You must go to America, and design the
machines for the Edison Company." So, after ineffectual efforts on the
other side to get somebody to interest himself in my plans financially,
I came to this country. I wish that I could only give you an idea how
what I saw here impressed me. You would be very much astonished. You
have all undoubtedly read those charming Arabian Nights tales, in which
the genie transports people into wonderful regions, to go through all
sorts of delightful adventures. My case was just the opposite. The
genie transported me from a world of dreams into one of realities. My
world was beautiful, ethereal, as I could imagine it. The one I found
here was a machine world; the contact was rough, but I liked it. I
realized from the very moment I saw Castle Garden that I was a good
American before I landed. Then came another event. I met Edison, and
the effect he produced upon me was extraordinary. When I saw this
wonderful man, who had had no theoretical training at all, no
advantages, who did all himself, getting great results by virtue of his
industry and application, I felt mortified that I had squandered my
life. I had studied a dozen languages, delved in literature and art and
had spent my best years in ruminating through libraries and reading all
sorts of stuff that fell into my hands. I thought to myself, what a
terrible thing it was to have wasted my life in those useless efforts.
If I had only come to America earlier and devoted all of my brain power
to inventive work, what might I have done? In later life though, I
realized I would not have produced anything without the scientific
training I got, and it is a question whether my surmise as to my
possible accomplishment was correct. In Edison's works I passed nearly
a year of the most strenuous labor, and then certain capitalists
approached me with the project to form my own company. I went into the
proposition, and developed the arc light. To show you how prejudiced
people were against the alternating-current, as the President has
indicated, when I told these friends of mine that I had a great
invention relating to alternating-current transmission, they said: "No,
we want the arc lamp. We do not care for this alternating-current."
Finally I perfected my lighting system and the city adopted it. Then I
succeeded in organizing another company, in April, 1886, and a
laboratory was put up, where I rapidly developed these motors, and
eventually the Westinghouse people approached us, and an arrangement was
made for their introduction. You know what has happened since then.
The invention has swept the world.
I should like to say
just a few words regarding the Niagara Falls enterprise. We have a man
here to-night to whom belongs really the credit for the early steps and
for the first financiering of the project, which was difficult at that
time. I refer to Mr. E. D. Adams. When I heard that such authorities
as Lord Kelvin and Prof. W. C. Unwin had recommended—one the
direct-current system and the other compressed air—for the transmission
of power from Niagara Falls to Buffalo, I thought it was dangerous to
let the matter go further, and I went to see Mr. Adams. I remember the
interview perfectly. Mr. Adams was much impressed with what I told
him. We had some correspondence afterwards, and whether it was in
consequence of my enlightening him on the situation, or owing to some
other influence, my system was adopted. Since that time, of course, new
men, new interests have come in, and what has been done I do not know,
except that the Niagara Falls enterprise was the real starting impulse
in the great movement inaugurated for the transmission and
transformation of energy on a huge scale.
Mr. Terry has referred
to other inventions of mine. I will just make a few remarks relative to
these as some of my work has been misunderstood. It seems to me that I
ought to tell you a few words about an effort that absorbed my attention
later. In 1892 I delivered a lecture at the Royal Institution and Lord
Rayleigh surprised me by acknowledging my work in very generous terms,
something that is not customary, and among other things he stated that I
had really an extraordinary gift for invention. Up to that time, I can
assure you, I had hardly realized that I was an inventor. I remembered,
for instance, when I was a boy, I could go out into the forest and catch
as many crows as I wanted, and nobody else could do it. Once, when I
was seven years of age, I repaired a fire engine which the engineers
could not make work, and they carried me in triumph through the city. I
constructed turbines, clocks and such devices as no other boy in the
community. I said to myself: "If I really have a gift for invention, I
will bend it to some great purpose or task and not squander my efforts
on small things." Then I began to ponder just what was the greatest deed
to accomplish. One day as I was walking in the forest a storm gathered
and I ran under a tree for shelter. The air was very heavy, and all at
once there was a lightning flash, and immediately after a torrent of
rain fell. That gave me the first idea. I realized that the sun was
lifting the water vapor, and wind swept it over the regions where it
accumulated and reached a condition when it was easily condensed and
fell to earth again. This life-sustaining stream of water was entirely
maintained by sun power, and lightning, or some other agency of this
kind, simply came in a trigger-mechanism to release the energy at the
proper moment. I started out and attacked the problem of constructing a
machine which would enable us to precipitate this water whenever and
wherever desired. If this was possible, then we could draw unlimited
amounts of water from the ocean, create lakes, rivers and water falls,
and indefinitely increase the hydroelectric power, of which there is now
a limited supply. That led me to the production of very intense
electrical effects. At the same time my wireless work, which I had
already begun, was exactly in that direction, and I devoted myself to
the perfection of that device, and in 1908, I filed an application
describing an apparatus with which I thought the wonder could be
achieved. The Patent Office Examiner was from Missouri, he would not
believe that it could be done, and my patent was never granted. But in
Colorado I had constructed a transmitter by which I produced effects in
some respects at least greater than those of lightning. I do not mean
in potential. The highest potential I reached was something like
20,000,000 volts, which is insignificant as compared to that of
lightning, but certain effects produced by my apparatus were greater
than those of lightning. For instance, I obtained in my antennae
currents of from 1,000 to 1,100 amperes. That was in 1899 and you know
that in the biggest wireless plants of today only 250 amperes are used.
In Colorado I succeeded one day in precipitating a dense fog. There was
a mist outside, but when I turned on the current the cloud in the
laboratory became so dense that when the hand was held only a few inches
from the face it could not be seen. I am positive in my conviction that
we can erect a plant of proper design in an arid region, work it
according to certain observations and rules, and by its means draw from
the ocean unlimited amounts of water for irrigation and power purposes.
If I do not live to carry it out, somebody else will, but I feel sure
that I am right.
As to the transmission
of power through space, that is a project which I considered absolutely
certain of success long since. Years ago I was in the position to
transmit wireless power to any distance without limit other than that
imposed by the physical dimensions of the globe. In my system it makes
no difference what the distance is. The efficiency of the transmission
can be as high as 96 or 97 per cent, and there are practically no losses
except such as are inevitable in the running of the machinery. When
there is no receiver there is no energy consumption anywhere. When the
receiver is put on, it draws power. That is the exact opposite of the
Hertz-wave system. In that case, if you have a plant of 1,000
horsepower, it is radiating all the time whether the energy is received
or not; but in my system no power is lost. When there are no receivers
the plant consumes only a few horsepower necessary to maintain the
electric vibration; it runs idle, as the Edison plant when the lamps and
motors are shut off.
I have made advances
along this line in later years which will contribute to the practical
features of the system. Recently I have obtained a patent on a
transmitter with which it is practicable to transfer unlimited amount of
energy to any distance.
I had a very
interesting experience with Mr. Stone, whom I consider, if not the
ablest, certainly one of the ablest living experts. I said to Mr.
Stone: ''Did you see my patent?" He replied: "Yes, I saw it, but I
thought you were crazy." When I explained it to Mr. Stone he said, "Now,
I see; why, that is great," and he understood how the energy is
transmitted.
To conclude, gentlemen,
we are coming to great results, but we must be prepared for a condition
of paralysis for quite a while. We are facing a crisis such as the
world has never seen before, and until the situation clears the best
thing we can do is to devise some scheme for overcoming the submarines,
and that is what I am doing now. (Applause)
ALFRED H. COWLES: Here
are some pictures you gave to me twenty years ago, relating to your
experiments of 1899, I think you will be interested in seeing them.
(Hands pictures to Mr. Tesla)
NIKOLA TESLA: I have
learned how to put up a plant that will develop a tension of 100,000,000
volts and handle it with perfect safety. This plant (indicating) was in
Colorado. If anybody, who had not been dabbling in these experiments as
long as myself, had done such work, he would surely have been killed.
In this plant I had the narrowest escape ever. It was a square
building, in which there was a coil 52 feet in diameter, about nine feet
high. When it was adjusted to resonance, the streamers passed from top
to bottom and it was a most beautiful sight. You see, that was about
fifteen hundred, perhaps two thousand square feet of streamer surface.
To save money I had calculated the dimensions as closely as possible,
and the streamers came within six or seven inches from the sides of the
building. As boys had been looking through a single window provided in
the rear, I nailed it up. For handling the heavy currents, I had a
special switch. It was hard to pull, and I had a spring arranged so
that I could just touch the handle and it would snap in. I sent one of
my assistants down town and was experimenting alone. I threw up the
switch and went behind the coil to examine something. While I was there
the switch snapped in, when suddenly the whole room was filled with
streamers, and I had no way of getting out. I tried to break through
the window but in vain as I had no tools, and there was nothing else to
do than to throw myself on my stomach and pass under. The primary
carried 500,000 volts, and I had to crawl through the narrow place here
(pointing) with the streamers going. The nitrous acid was so strong I
could hardly breathe. These streamers rapidly oxidize nitrogen because
of their enormous surface, which makes up for what they lack in
intensity. When I came to the narrow space they closed on my back. I
got away and barely managed to open the switch when the building began
to burn. I grabbed a fire extinguisher and succeeded in smothering the
fire. Then I had enough, I was all in. But now I can operate a plant
without any fear of its destruction by fire. Mr. Cowles is responsible
for excursion into this matter. (Applause)
THE PRESIDENT: If there
is no further business, we will consider this meeting adjourned.
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