Tesla: The Life and Times of an Electric Messiah by Nigel Cawthorne

had announced that Tesla was ‘greater even than Edison’, but New York’s Troy Press asked: ‘Who is electric king, Edison or Tesla?’ Meanwhile, the two men, now billed as the ‘Twin Wizards of Electricity’, were appearing at the National Electrical Exposition in Philadelphia. Tesla was then on the ascendant as AC had been transmitted along telephone lines for a record-breaking 500 miles (800 km). Tesla was disappointed though as the power at the Exposition was restricted due to the fear of fire.
    By this time, Edison was conceding: ‘The most amazing thing about this Exposition is the demonstration of the ability to deliver here an electric current generated at Niagara Falls. To my mind it solves one of the most important questions associated with electrical development.’ Bell concurred, stating, ‘This long distance transmission of electric power was the most important discovery of electric science that had been made for many years.’
    Tesla told the Philadelphia Press : ‘I am now convinced beyond any question that it is possible to transmit electricity … to commercial advantage over a distance of 500 miles at half the cost of generation by steam … I am willing to stake my reputation and my life on this declaration.’
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    The Power of Electrical Healing
    Following on from Mark Twain’s idea, Tesla began to experiment on the healing properties of electricity in his new laboratory on Houston Street in Greenwich Village. At the time, doctors were promoting electricity as a ‘vitality booster’ and a ‘universal healing agent’. Some even said that it could cure tuberculosis, which was rife at the time. It was reported that Tesla took daily doses to deal with his depression after his lab burnt down. He said that high-frequencies ‘produce an anti-germicidal action’. As part of his daily routine, he would strip off and climb on board his apparatus and crank up the juice.
    He was also said to be working on an electric weeding tool to clear railroad tracks of unwanted undergrowth. He paid a short visit to Colorado, where he claimed to have transmitted a signal through Pike’s Peak, using the energy of the Earth, rather than his oscillators. Announcing the success of this experiment in Arthur Brisbane’s newspaper The World on 8 March 1896, he said: ‘Electricity would be as free as the air. The end has come to telegraph, telephone companies, and other monopolies … with a crash.’
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    X-Rays, Shadowgraphs and Cosmic Rays
    While running a current through partially evacuated glass tubes, Tesla had also noticed a special radiation was given off that could be detected by phosphorescent and fluorescent substances. In 1892, he gave lectures on what he called ‘black light and very special radiation’. Experimenting with his radiation he notice that he could produce what he called ‘Shadowgraphs’ on plates inside metal containers. Unfortunately, these were lost when his laboratory burned down.
    When he read of Röntgen ’s discovery of X-rays, he realized that these were the same thing as his ‘very special radiation’. He produced more shadowgraphs and sent them to Röntgen who asked how they had been made.
    Tesla quickly realized that he could get better results with a Tesla Coil that developed 4 million volts. While others were X-raying thin structures such as hands and feet, he was taking photographs through the skull at a distance of 40 ft (12 m) from the tube.
    While experimenting, Tesla noticed that the energy had both particle and wave-like attributes, something later recognized by Albert Einstein. He also speculated that the tiny lumps of matter involved, later known as electrons, might be broken up into even smaller pieces and said that ‘similar streams must be emitted by the Sun’ – what we now know as cosmic rays.
    Tesla X-rayed birds and animals, himself and