Chapter 3
How Tesla
Conceived The Rotary Magnetic Field
At the age of ten I entered the Real gymnasium which
was a new and fairly well equipped institution.
In the department of physics were various models of
classical scientific apparatus, electrical and mechanical. The demonstrations
and experiments performed from time to time by the instructors fascinated me
and were undoubtedly a powerful incentive to invention.
I was also passionately fond of mathematical studies
and often won the professor’s praise for rapid calculation.
This was due to my acquired facility of visualising
the figures and performing the operation, not in the usual intuitive manner,
but as in actual life.
Up to a certain degree of complexity it was absolutely
the same to me whether I wrote the symbols on the board or conjured them before
my mental vision.
But freehand drawing, to which many hours of the
course were devoted, was an annoyance I could not endure.
This was rather remarkable as most of the members of
the family excelled in it.
Perhaps my aversion was simply due to the predilection
I found in undisturbed thought.
Had it not been for a few exceptionally stupid boys,
who could not do anything at all, my record would have been the worst.
It was a serious handicap as under the then existing
educational regime drawing being obligatory, this deficiency threatened to
spoil my whole career and my father had considerable trouble in rail-roading me
from one class to another.
In the second year at that institution I became obsessed
with the idea of producing continuous motion through steady air pressure. The
pump incident, of which I have been told, had set afire my youthful imagination
and impressed me with the boundless possibilities of a vacuum.
I grew frantic in my desire to harness this
inexhaustible energy but for a long time I was groping in the dark.
Finally, however, my endeavours crystallised in an
invention which was to enable me to achieve what no other mortal ever
attempted.
Imagine a cylinder freely rotable on two bearings and
partly surrounded by a rectangular trough which fits it perfectly.
The open side of the trough is enclosed by a partition
so that the cylindrical segment within the enclosure divides the latter into
two compartments entirely separated from each other by air-tight sliding
joints.
One of these compartments being sealed and once for
all exhausted, the other remaining open, a perpetual rotation of the cylinder
would result.
At least, so I thought.
A wooden model was constructed and fitted with
infinite care and when I applied the pump on one side and actual observed that
there was a tendency to turning, I was delirious with joy.
Mechanical flight was the one thing I wanted to
accomplish although still under the discouraging recollection of a bad fall I
sustained by jumping with an umbrella from the top of a building.
Every day I used to transport myself through the air
to distant regions but could not understand just how I managed to do it.
Now I had something concrete, a flying machine with
nothing more than a rotating shaft, flapping wings, and; - a vacuum of
unlimited power!
From that time on I made my daily aerial excursions in
a vehicle of comfort and luxury as might have befitted King Solomon.
It took years before I understood that the atmospheric
pressure acted at right angles to the surface of the cylinder and that the
slight rotary effort I observed was due to a leak!
Though this knowledge came gradually it gave me a
painful shock.
I had hardly completed my
course at the Real Gymnasium when I was prostrated
with a dangerous illness or rather, a score of
them, and my condition became so
desperate that I was given up by physicians.
During this period I was permitted to read constantly,
obtaining books from the Public Library which had been neglected and entrusted
to me for classification of the works and preparation of catalogues.
One day I was handed a few volumes of new literature
unlike anything I had ever read before and so captivating as to make me utterly
forget me hopeless state.
They were the earlier works of Mark Twain and to them
might have been due the miraculous recovery which followed.
Twenty-five years later, when I met Mr. Clements and we formed a friendship between
us, I told him of the experience and was amazed to see that great man of
laughter burst into tears...
My studies were continued at the higher Real Gymnasium
in Carlstadt, Croatia, where one of my aunts resided.
She was a distinguished lady, the wife of a Colonel
who was an old war-horse having participated in many battles, I can never
forget the three years I passed at their home.
No fortress in time of war was under a more rigid
discipline.
I was fed like a canary bird.
All the meals were of the highest quality and deliciously
prepared, but short in quantity by a thousand percent.
The slices of ham cut by my aunt were like tissue
paper.
When the Colonel would put something substantial on my
plate she would snatch it away and say excitedly to him; “Be careful. Niko is
very delicate.”
I had a voracious appetite and suffered like
Tantalus.
But I lived in an atmosphere of refinement and
artistic taste quite unusual for those times and conditions.
The land was low and marshy and malaria fever never
left me while there despite the enormous amounts of qunine I consumed.
Occasionally the river would rise and drive an army of
rats into the buildings, devouring everything, even to the bundles of fierce
paprika.
These pests were to me a welcome diversion.
I thinned their ranks by all sorts of means, which won
me the unenviable distinction of rat-catcher in the community.
At last, however, my course was completed, the misery
ended, and I obtained the certificate of maturity which brought me to the
cross-roads.
During all those years my parents never wavered in
their resolve to make me embrace the clergy, the mere thought of which filled
me with dread.
I had become intensely interested in electricity under
the stimulating influence of my Professor of Physics, who was an ingenious man
and often demonstrated the principles by apparatus of his own invention.
Among these I recall a device in the shape of a freely
rotatable bulb, with tinfoil coating, which was made to spin rapidly when
connected to a static machine.
It is impossible for me to convey an adequate idea of
the intensity of feeling I experienced in witnessing his exhibitions of these
mysterious phenomena.
Every impression produced a thousand echoes in my
mind.
I wanted to know more of this wonderful force; I longed
for experiment and investigation and resigned myself to the inevitable with
aching heart.
Just as I was making ready for the long journey home I
received word that my father wished me to go on a shooting expedition.
It was a strange request as he had been always
strenuously opposed to this kind of sport.
But a few days later I learned that the cholera was
raging in that district and, taking advantage of an opportunity, I returned to
Gospic in disregard to my parent’s wishes.
It is incredible how absolutely ignorant people were
as to the causes of this scourge which visited the country in intervals of
fifteen to twenty years.
They thought that the deadly agents were transmitted
through the air and filled it with pungent odours and smoke.
In the meantime they drank infested water and died in
heaps.
I contracted the dreadful disease on the very day of
my arrival and although surviving the crisis, I was confined to bed for nine
months with scarcely any ability to move.
My energy was completely exhausted and for the second
time I found myself at Death’s door.
In one of the sinking spells which was thought to be
the last, my father rushed into the room.
I still see his pallid face as he tried to cheer me in
tones belying his assurance.
“Perhaps,” I said, “I may get well if you will let me
study engineering.”
“You will go to the best technical institution in the
world,” he solemnly replied, and I knew that he meant it.
A heavy weight was lifted from my mind but the relief
would have come too late had it not been for a marvellous cure brought through
a bitter decoction of a peculiar bean.
I came to life like Lazarus to the utter amazement of
everybody.
My father insisted that I spend a year in healthful
physical outdoor exercise to which I reluctantly consented.
For most of this term I roamed in the mountains,
loaded with a hunter’s outfit and a bundle of books, and this contact with
nature made me stronger in body as well as in mind.
I thought and planned, and conceived many ideas almost
as a rule delusive.
The vision was clear enough but the knowledge of
principles was very limited.
In one of my invention I proposed to convey letters
and packages across the seas, through a submarine tube, in spherical containers
of sufficient strength to resist the hydraulic pressure.
The pumping plant, intended to force the water through
the tube, was accurately figured and designed and all other particulars
carefully worked out.
Only one trifling detail, of no consequence, was
lightly dismissed.
I assumed an arbitrary velocity of the water and, what
is more, took pleasure in making it high, thus arriving at a stupendous
performance supported by faultless calculations.
Subsequent reflections, however, on the resistance of
pipes to fluid flow induced me to make this invention public property.
Another one of my projects was to construct a ring
around the equator which would, of course, float freely and could be arrested
in its spinning motion by reactionary forces, thus enabling travel at a rate of
about one thousand miles an hour, impracticable by rail.
The reader will smile.
The plan was difficult of execution, I will admit, but
not nearly so bad as that of a well known New York professor, who wanted to
pump the air from the torrid to temperate zones, entirely forgetful of the fact
that the Lord had provided a gigantic machine for this purpose.
Still another scheme, far more important and
attractive, was to derive power from the rotational energy of terrestrial
bodies.
I had discovered that objects on the earth’s surface
owing to the diurnal rotation of the globe, are carried by the same alternately
in and against the direction of translatory movement.
From this results a great change in momentum which
could be utilised in the simplest imaginable manner to furnish motive effort in
any habitable region of the world.
I cannot find words to describe my disappointment when
later I realised that I was in the predicament of Archimedes, who vainly sought
for a fixed point in the universe.
At the termination of my vacation I was sent to the
Poly-Technic School in Gratz, Styria (Austria), which my father had chosen as
one of the oldest and best reputed institutions.
That was the moment I had eagerly awaited and I began
my studies under good auspices and firmly resolved to succeed.
My previous training was above average, due to my
father’s teaching and opportunities afforded.
I had acquired the knowledge of a number of languages
and waded through the books of several libraries, picking up information more
or less useful.
Then again, for the first time, I could choose my
subjects as I liked, and free-hand drawing was to bother me no more.
I had made up my mind to give my parents a surprise,
and during the whole first year I regularly started my work at three o’clock in
the morning and continued until eleven at night, no Sundays or holidays
excepted.
As most of my fellow-students took things easily,
naturally I eclipsed all records.
In the course of the year I passed through nine exams
and the professors thought I deserved more than the highest qualifications.
Armed with their flattering certificated, I went home
for a short rest, expecting triumph, and was mortified when my father made
light of these hard-won honours.
That almost killed my ambition; but later, after he
had died, I was pained to find a package of letters which the professors had
written to him to the effect that unless he took me away from the Institution I
would be killed through overwork.
Thereafter I devoted myself chiefly to physics,
mechanics and mathematical studies, spending the hours of leisure in the
libraries.
I had a veritable mania for finishing whatever I
began, which often got me into difficulties.
On one occasion I started to read the works of Voltaire,
when I learned, to my dismay that there were close to one hundred large volumes
in small print which that monster had written while drinking seventy-two cups
of black coffee per diem.
It had to be done, but when I laid aside that last
book I was very glad, and said, “Never more!”
My first year’s showing had won me the appreciation
and friendship of several professors.
Among these, Professor Rogner, who was teaching
arithmetical subjects and geometry; Professor Poeschl, who held the chair of
theoretical and experimental physics, and Dr. Alle, who taught integral
calculus and specialised in differential equations.
This scientist was the most brilliant lecturer to whom
I ever listened.
He took a special interest in my progress and would
frequently remain for an hour or two in the lecture room, giving me problems to
solve, in which I delighted.
To him I explained a flying machine I had conceived,
not an illusory invention, but one based on sound, scientific principles, which
has become realisable through my turbine and will soon be given to the world.
Both Professors Rogner and Poeschl were curious men.
The former had peculiar ways of expressing himself and
whenever he did so, there was a riot, followed by a long embarrassing pause.
Professor Poeschl was a methodical and thoroughly
grounded German.
He had enormous feet, and hands like the paws of a
bear, but all of his experiments were skilfully performed with clock-like
precision and without a miss.
It was in the second year of my studies that we
received a Gramoe Dyname from Paris, having the horseshoe form of a laminated
field magnet, and a wire wound armature with a commutator.
It was connected up and various effects of the
currents were shown.
While Professor Poeschl was making demonstrations,
running the machine was a motor, the brushes gave trouble, sparking badly, and
I observed that it might be possible to operate a motor without these
appliances.
But he declared that it could not be done and did me
the honour of delivering a lecture on the subject, at the conclusion he
remarked,
“Mr. Tesla may accomplish great things, but he
certainly will never do this. It would be equivalent to converting a steadily
pulling force, like that of gravity into a rotary effort.
It is a perpetual motion scheme, an impossible idea.”
But instinct is something which transcends knowledge.
We have, undoubtedly, certain finer fibres that enable
us to perceive truths when logical deduction, or any other wilful effort of the
brain, is futile.
For a time I wavered, impressed by the professor’s
authority, but soon became convinced I was right and undertook the task with
all the fire and boundless confidence of my youth.
I started by first picturing in my mind a
direct-current machine, running it and following the changing flow of the
currents in the armature.
Then I would imagine an alternator and investigate the
progresses taking place in a similar manner.
Next I would visualise systems comprising motors and
generators and operate them in various ways.
The images I saw were to me perfectly real and
tangible.
All my remaining term in Gratz was passed in intense
but fruitless efforts of this kind, and I almost came to the conclusion that
the problem was insolvable.
In 1880 I went to Prague, Bohemia, carrying out my
father’s wish to complete my education at the University there.
It was in that city that I made a decided advance,
which consisted in detaching the commutator from the machine and studying the
phenomena in this new aspect, but still without result.
In the year following there was a sudden change in my
views of life.
I realised that my parents had been making too great
sacrifices on my account and resolved to relieve them of the burden.
The wave of the American telephone had just reached
the European continent and the system was to be installed in Budapest, Hungary.
It appeared an ideal opportunity, all the more as a
friend of our family was at the head of the enterprise.
It was here that I suffered the complete breakdown of
the nerves to which I have referred.
What I experienced during the period of the illness
surpasses all belief.
My sight and hearing were always extraordinary.
I could clearly discern objects in the distance when
others saw no trace of them.
Several times in my boyhood I saved the houses of our
neighbours from fire by hearing the faint crackling sounds which did not
disturb their sleep, and calling for help.
In 1899, when I was past forty and carrying on my
experiments in Colorado, I could hear very distinctly thunderclaps at a
distance of 550 miles.
My ear was thus over thirteen times more sensitive,
yet at that time I was, so to speak, stone deaf in comparison with the
acuteness of my hearing while under the nervous strain.
In Budapest I could hear the ticking of a watch with
three rooms between me and the time-piece.
A fly alighting on a table in the room would cause a
dull thud in my ear.
A carriage passing at a distance of a few miles fairly
shook my whole body.
The whistle of a locomotive twenty or thirty miles
away made the bench or chair on which I sat, vibrate so strongly that the pain
was unbearable.
The ground under my feet trembled continuously.
I had to support my bed on rubber cushions to get any
rest at all.
The roaring noises from near and far often produced
the effect of spoken words which would have frightened me had I not been able
to resolve them into their accumulated components.
The sun rays, when periodically intercepted, would
cause blows of such force on my brain that they would stun me.
I had to summon all my will power to pass under a
bridge or other structure, as I experienced the crushing pressure on the skull.
In the dark I had the sense of a bat, and could detect
the presence of an object at a distance of twelve feet by a peculiar creepy
sensation on the forehead.
My pulse varied from a few to two hundred and sixty
beats and all the tissues of my body with twitchings and tremors, which was
perhaps hardest to bear.
A renowned physician who have me daily large doses of
Bromide of Potassium, pronounced my malady unique and incurable.
It is my eternal regret that I was not under the
observation of experts in physiology and psychology at that time.
I clung desperately to life, but never expected to
recover.
Can anyone believe that so hopeless a physical wreck
could ever be transformed into a man of astonishing strength and tenacity; able
to work thirty-eight years almost without a day’s interruption, and find
himself still strong and fresh in body and mind?
Such is my case.
A powerful desire to live and to continue the work and
the assistance of a devoted friend, an athlete, accomplished the wonder.
My health returned and with it the vigour of mind.
In attacking the problem again, I almost regretted
that the struggle was soon to end.
I had so much energy to spare.
When I understood the task, it was not with a resolve
such as men often make.
With me it was a sacred vow, a question of life and
death.
I knew that I would perish if I failed.
Now I felt that the battle was won.
Back in the deep recesses of the brain was the
solution, but I could net yet give it outward expression.
One afternoon, which is ever present in my
recollection, I was enjoying a walk with my friend in the City Park and
reciting poetry.
At that age, I knew entire books by heart, word for
word.
One of these was Goethe’s “Faust.”
The sun was just setting and reminded me of the glorious
passage, “Sie ruckt und weicht, der Tag ist uberlebt, Dort eilt sie hin und
fordert neues Leben. Oh, da kein Flugel mich vom Boden hebt Ihr nach und immer
nach zu streben! Ein schûner Traum indessen sie entweicht, Ach, au des Geistes
Flugein wird so leicht Kein korperlicher Flugel sich gesellen!“
As I uttered these inspiring words the idea came like
a flash of lightening and in an instant the truth was revealed.
I drew with a stick on the sand, the diagram shown six
years later in my address before the American Institute of Electrical
Engineers, and my companion understood them perfectly.
The images I saw were wonderfully sharp and clear and
had the solidity of metal and stone, so much so that I told him, “See my motor
here; watch me reverse it.”
I cannot begin to describe my emotions.
Pygmalion seeing his statue come to life could not
have been more deeply moved.
A thousand secrets of nature which I might have
stumbled upon accidentally, I would have given for that one which I had wrested
from her against all odds and at the peril of my existence...