Tombstone epitaph., 1917-06-17

pense with artificial batteries. but use the free electricity of the at- mosphere, cooperating with that of the earth to supply the electrical dy- manic force or current for telegraph ing and for other useful purposes, such as light. heat and motive power. "As atmospheric electricity is found more snd more abundant when mois- ture. clouds, heated currents of air and other dissipating influences are left far below and a greater altitude attained. my plan is to seek as high an elevation as practicable on the tops of high mountains and thus penetrate or establish electrical connection with the atmospheric stratum or ocean overly Ing local disturbances. Upon these mounfain tops I erect suitable towers | and apparatus to attract the electric ity. or in other words to disturb the electrical equilibrium and thus obtain current of electricity. or shocks, or pulsations. which traverse or disturb the positive electrical body of the at- mosphere above and between two given points by communicating 1t to the negative electrical body in the earth below to form the electric current"
 After declaring that the inventor did not utilize any new keyboard or alphabet. the patent concludes with the assertion that he claims:
 The utilization of natural cleo tricity from elevated points by con- meeting the opposite polarity of the celestial and terrestial bodies of cleo tricity at different points by suitable conductors, and for telegraphlc pur- poses relying upon the disturbance produced In the two electro-opposite bodies (of the earth and the at- mosphere) by an Interruption of the continuity of one of the conductors from an electrical body being indi- cated upon Its opposite or correspond. ing terminus, and thus producing a cir cult Of communication between the two without an artificial battery or the further use of wires or cables to connect the cooperating stations"
 The fate of the Loomis invention was not long in being determined. His company was formed and experi. ments were carried on, but the Gin this day) manlfestly impossible scheme was soon found to be impracticable, despite the several advanced ideas presented. and the proposition pres ently went to smash, adding another name to the great roll of disappointed and disIliusioned pioneers.
 Although Loomis was the first man to get recognition in the American congress for wireless discovery, men had irlklings of the possibility of the thing 50 years before him. About the frs. to take up the work was Doc tor Steinheil of Munich. who in 1888 evolved some of the basic features of the science. Morse in 1S42 saw that teiegraphing without wires would some day be possible. but he was too busy with the wire method to spend any time on the other plan.
 The credit for the successful appli- cation of the principles of wireless communication of course belongs to Marconi, who has had the wit and the resource to employ the work of his predecessors in the field and actually to produce the now wonderful result. Marconi's real accomplishment is of comparatively recent date and It owes much even to The dreamings of Doe for Loomis. not to mention fine experi- menting of such eminent minds as J. Trowbridge in 1880. Sir w. II. Preece in 1882, WiIl1ughby Smith. Sir Oliver Lodge. Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas A. Edison and numerous others who contributed to the general result.
 The employment of the Hprtzian waves. discovered by Hertz in 1886 and ian's invention of the anteRnae. for the detection of electric impulses. resulted finally in the commercial wireless of today, which in seeming perfection Is still but in its infancy. Greater marvels are yet in store for the world than even the direction of torpedoes by wireless and the sending of mes sages from New York to Honolulu and than even wireless communities ton between fighting airplanes and ground stations far back of the bat tie lines. Yet these accomplishments are a far cry from that day in 1899 when two British cruisers at maneuy- CTS were able to communicate with each other by telegraph and the world thought that the summit of wonders had been achieved.-New York Sun.