The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1910-06-04
Deadly Electric Current May
Be Cause of World Wide Peace

Electricity as the coming agency OF
worldwide peace will be one of the
chief subjects discussed at the twenty
fifth annual convention Of the Nation
al Electric Light association at St
Louis, beginning May 23, because OF
the general belief among the leaders
of the electrical industry that array
will be developed in the very near
future which will be the deadliest en-
CINE of destruction ever conceived.
In other words, the experts feel that
electricity will be so handled that wal
will be absolutely futile. In Europe
| the newspapers have been discussing
experiments by some scientists, wht
claim to have thrown a certain kind 81
| electrical current so that it dealt deatt
| to horse at a distance of four miles
| The claim is made that whole armies
could be struck down in the same fash
ion, and American electrical experts
are not inclined to scott, because they
recall the. prediction of Nickola Tesla
made in a public address in 1898, that
this would be one of the accomplish
ments of the future.
American experts have also long been
discussing the probabilities of an in
vention which would render airships
wholly useless as an agency Of war
fare, and that would even put the
greatest battleships ever built out OF
| commission long before they got within
range where they could do any execu-
ton themselves.
| Speaking before the National Elec-
trio Light association in 1898, in the
same city where the coming convention
is to be held, Tesla said:
81 firmly believe that it is practicable
to disturb, by means of powerful ma
| chine, the electro static condition OF
| the earth, and thus transmit intelligi-
BILE signals and, perhaps, power. In
| fact, what is there against the carry
| ing out of such a scheme? We now
know that electric vibration may be
| transmitted through a single conduc-
tor. Why then, not try to avail our
selves of the earth for this purpose
We need not be frightened by the idea
OF distance. To the weary wandereI
| counting the mile posts, the earth
! may appear very large, but to that
happiest of all men, the astronomer
who gazes at the heavens, and by their
standard judges the magnitude of our
globe, it appears very small. And sc
think it must seem to the electrician:
for when he considers the speed with
which an electric disturbance is pro-
pagated through the earth all his ideas
of distance must vanish.
"A point of great importance would
be first to know what is the capacity
of the earth, and what charge does II
contain If electrified. Though we have
no positive evidence of a charged body
existing in space without other OPP
positeIy electrified bodies being near
there is a fair probability that the earth
is such body, for by whatever pro-
cess it was separated from other bod
ies-and this is the accepted view OF
its origin--it must have retained a
charge as occurs in all processes OF
mechanical separation. If it should
be charged body insulated in space, its
capacity would be extremely small
less than one-thousandth OF a far
adj #s&
whether the earth contains a
charge or not, and whatever may be
IT'S period of vibration. 1t certainly is
possible-for of this we have daily evil
dence--to produce some electrical dis
turbance sufficiently powerful to be
perceptibIe by suitable instruments at
any point of the earth's surface"