The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1920-04-15

VWNV19XH to picture the transformation OF
aGgN9zH everyday life that will follow
upon the successful applications of Mr.. Tel
sa's new invention with the achievement of
others in this field of science foreshadow
novel apparatus and processed of great use
fulness and value to engineering and the
other practical arts.
To flash electricity wirelessly through
the globe, not in driblets but in millions of
horsepower, and to transform this earth from
globular crust, on which men move and
live, into a planetary powerhouse from
which people to the remotest part of the
world may draw what energie they need is
vision which has haunted some of our fore
most inventors for years. When it comes,
that wireless millennium, the cumbrous ma
chinery and tangle of electric conductors
that serve us now will be swept away. In
far off Tibet or nearby Chicago, in northern
Hammerfest or southern Melbourne, we
shall warm ourselves, cook our food, drive
our streetcars, and light our houses with
energy generated in stations which have a
horse power twice that of Niagara Falls, and
which is transformed into electric currents
undulating through the earth with the speed
of light. Already we converse with each
other high up in the air, we shall see one
another with keen, scientifically constructed
eyes, although oceans and continents separate
us; we shall travel through the air in mar
velously constructed aircraft which will de-
rive their power from the earth; we shall
convert night into day with illuminants
which will be mere tubes and globes of cold
light gas filled or vacuum tubes through
which currents measured by millions of volts
will flash. Part of the mechanism with which
these stupendous results are to be achieved
was disclosed in United States patent
granted to Mr.. Telsa, recently. That bears
the simple title, Apparatus for Transmit
ting Electrical Energy" This apparatus
for Transmitting Electrical Energy" is the
principal element in whole system of arti-
fees which, when developed to their fullest
possibilities, will make electricity as essential
incur lives as the air we breathe.
To understand this transformation of
the future, we must begin with wireless tele-
graphy, not because it bears any similarity to
the principles which inventors are seeking to
apply but because it is so different.
Throw a pebble into pool of water.
Little waves will ripple out in overwhelming
circles and finally die away. An electric
spark-a miniature artificial flash of light
ning-sends forth similar overwhelming
electrical waves at the tremendous velocity
of one hundred and eight-six thousand miles
second. Because our retinas are not con-
stituted to see these waves, we must use a
specially designed artificial eye. Every wire
less telegraphic receiving station contains
such an eye to visualize the Morse signals
flashed by the electric spark in the transmit
ting station.
Because electrical waves represent
energy not few inventros have tried to use
them for other purposes than flashing the
dots and dashes of the Morse CODE Probab-
ly the most CONSPICUOUS of the men is John
Hays Hammond, Junior, whose crewless,
wirelessly directed boat and electric dog
have attracted much attention.
But all this is scarcely worldwide
distribution of power. Without exception
these inventors are dealing with wireless sig
nails. The waves sent out from their trans
mitters are not directly utilized to run q
motor or light lamp but to control electri,
cal machinery with which we are all familiar
In crewless submarine boats, in picture-re'
cording apparatus wireless operated, we find
in the receiving station, all the mechanism
that we now install in boats or telegraph
stations The waves simply act on delicate
receiver, and thus open and close an electric
circuit. They take the place of the human
hand in throwing switch nothing more.
In large sense, all these men are send
ing energy without wires through space. Bu
what wasteful method, wonderful as it is
Of all the energy ripping out from th'
transmitting spark, not one part in one hun