January 3rd, New York. Tesla made an almost unbelievable discovery two years ago in Colorado while doing experiments on wireless energy transmission. He worked in a specially built laboratory. When asked to give some visible form or notation to the message he had received today, he smiled emphatically and replied:
The Discoverer Believes That One Of The Planets Has Already Perfected An Interplanetary Communication Scheme.
“As I have already said, one of the planets in the solar system may be ahead of us in evolution. Their means of interplanetary communication may be perfect, but we have yet to learn their sign language. It is impossible at present, even to suggest a code and my observations to the Red Cross Society on New Year’s Eve were purely speculative, but for purposes of illustration, they will answer the purpose at present.
“It is enough to say at this time that a message from Mars which might be a triangle to them would appear as some other form to us, and vice-versa. These differences can only be reconciled by time and careful study. It is wonderful enough, is it not, that a beginning has been made.
“On Pike’s Peak, I set out to carry on my experiments along three different lines:
“First, to ascertain the best conditions for transmitting power without wires. Second, to develop apparatus for the transmission of messages across the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. And, third, to work on another problem, which involves a still greater mastery of the electrical force.”
“I consider of still greater importance than even the transmission of power without wires, and which I shall make known in due course.
“In my laboratory in New York, I was able to go only to electrical discharges of sixteen feet in length. I had only reached effective electrical pressures of about 8,000,000 volts. To carry the problems further I had to master electrical pressures of at least 50,000,000 volts. And electrical discharges were necessary for some purposes measuring at least fifty or one hundred feet.”
Tesla’s Results
“The results I attained were far beyond any I had expected to reach. I found that my mental vision was incomparably clearer, so much so that I could look back in thought at my laboratory in New York. And in examining familiar objects in the rooms there I could notice the smallest scratch on them. In scanning the features of my assistants I could noticed the slightest marks on their faces. As though they had been actually before me. Now in the city the mental images are much duller.
“One of the first observations I made in Colorado was of great scientific importance and confirmatory of a result I had already obtained in New York. I refer to my discovery of the stationary electrical waves in the earth. The significance of this phenomenon has not yet been grasped by technical men. But it virtually amounts to positive proof that, with proper apparatus. Such as I have perfected, wireless transmission of signals to any point on the globe is practicable. When I read statements to the effect that such a thing is impossible. Recall the numerous adverse criticisms of my expressed confidence that I can ultimately accomplish this. I experience a feeling of satisfaction.
“As I think over it now it seems to me that only a man struck with blindness. Insensible to the greatness of nature. It can hold that this planet is the only one inhabited by intelligent beings.”
Washington, DC, January 3 — In response to Nikola Tesla’s announcement, US Naval Observatory Professor S. I. Brown says:
“Any proclamation coming from Tesla is likely to be received with considerable incredulity. I have been looking in vain for some practicable results to follow the extravagant claims that he has constantly made during the past half-dozen years. Most of his discoveries have materialized only in statements such as this which he gives out every once in a while for publication.
“His assertion that he has found that some planet is signaling to the earth is remote even to the point of impossibility. He contradicts himself so frequently in the interview that it is hard to tell what he really means. He says, for instance, that his instruments have been affected by an unknown power, of which he is in ignorance. Then he goes on to declare his belief that it is due to an effort on the part of one of the planets to signal to us.
“He indicates that Mars might be the world that is attempting to communicate with us. It is most peculiar that any discovery involving Mars should be made just now. Once every fifteen years that planet reaches its greatest distance from the earth when it is 62,000,000 miles away. The nearest that it ever gets is 36,000,000 miles. It happens that just now Mars is at the farthest distance that it ever gets from us. Certainly, it is hard to understand why, at such an inopportune time. Signals from the Martians should have been detected by Tesla.”
More of what Tesla says
“Tesla indicates that this method of communication is based upon wireless telegraphy. Up to the present time, the greatest distance that a message has ever been sent by wireless telegraphy is about 100 miles. Yet he gravely talks about signaling through interplanetary space for a distance of 62,000,000 miles. The power of the electric wave vibrations involved in wireless telegraphy is inverse to the square of the distance they have traversed.
Thus the electrical power required on the planet Mars in order to communicate with this world would be 3,600,000,000,000,000 times as great as the power received here. Even the faintest sign of energy that might be received here when multiplied by that would represent an incredible force on the surface of the planet Mars. We can hardly use such an enormous power as that.
“Mars may be populated. “We cannot make any positive assertions regarding that. However, it will take more than a mere statement from Nikola Tesla to prove the existence of signals from the planet to us.”
What Others Think
“This is the first I have heard of Tesla’s latest accomplishment. You can rest assured it is imaginative and visionary. I do not care to make any further comment on it or the possibilities of the case.” According to A. S. Skinner of the United States Naval Observatory.
“Astronomers do not look forward to the discovery of communication between the planets. In fact, they take no interest in and pay no attention to the experiments of this character. There is no internal contradiction to the problem, being only a question of means on our side and the possibility of inhabitants on Mars. The first we have not discovered and the second we do not know anything about.
“Whether the atmosphere on the two planets would be an obstacle to communication would depend upon discoveries yet to be made. I would have to see a purely technical account of the experiment. Before I could form an idea of the value of the claim that communication has been established between the earth and Mars.
In an account devoid of scientific minutes it is impossible to dissect it with any degree of accuracy. I would prefer not to make any comments on this particular alleged discovery of Tesla’s.” Georgetown University astronomy professor Father John B. Hagan says
“I have read the story about this discovery. I do not care to say anything about it.” According to Naval Observatory Professor T. J. J. See.
