Nikola Tesla: Master of Lightening

Born an ethnic Serb in the village of Smiljan, Vojna Krajina, in the territory of today's Croatia, Tesla was a subject of the Austrian Empire by birth and later became an American citizen.[2] After his demonstration of wireless communication through radio in 1894 and after being the victor in the "War of Currents", he was widely respected as one of the greatest electrical engineers who worked in America.[3] Much of his early work pioneered modern electrical engineering and many of his discoveries were of groundbreaking importance. During this period, in the United States, Tesla's fame rivaled that of any other inventor or scientist in history or popular culture,[4] but
due to his eccentric personality and his seemingly unbelievable and sometimes bizarre claims about possible scientific and technological developments, Tesla was ultimately ostracized and regarded as a mad scientist.[5]
[6] Tesla never put much focus on his finances. It is said he died impoverished, at the age of 86.[7]

Aside from his work on electromagnetism and electromechanical engineering, Tesla contributed in varying degrees to the establishment of robotics, remote control, radar and computer science, and to the expansion of ballistics, nuclear physics,[8] and theoretical physics. In 1943, the Supreme Court of the United States credited him as being the inventor of the radio.[9] A few of his achievements have been used, with some controversy, to support various pseudosciences, UFO theories, and early New Age occultism.

During his early life, Tesla was stricken with illness time and time again. He suffered a peculiar affliction in which blinding flashes of light would appear before his eyes, often accompanied by hallucinations. Much of the time the visions were linked to a word or idea he might have come across; just by hearing the name of an item, he would involuntarily envision it in realistic detail. Modern-day synesthetes report similar symptoms. Tesla would visualise an invention in his brain with extreme precision, including all dimensions, before moving to the construction stage; a technique sometimes known as picture thinking. He typically did not make drawings by hand, instead just conceiving all ideas with his mind. Tesla also often had flashbacks to events that had happened previously in his life; this began to happen during childhood.[22]

On 6 June 1884, Tesla first arrived in the US in New York City[26] with little besides a letter of recommendation from Charles Batchelor, a former employer. In the letter of recommendation to Thomas Edison, Batchelor wrote, "I know two great men and you are one of them; the other is this young man." Edison hired Tesla to work for his Edison Machine Works. Tesla's work for Edison began with simple electrical engineering and quickly progressed to solving some of the company's most difficult problems. Tesla was even offered the task of completely redesigning the Edison company's direct current generators.[27]

Tesla claims he was offered US$50,000 (~ US$1.1 million in 2007, adjusted for inflation)[28] if he redesigned Edison's inefficient motor and generators, making an improvement in both service and economy.[22]:54–57 Tesla said he worked night and day on the project and gave the Edison Company several profitable new patents in the process. In 1885 when Tesla inquired about the payment for his work, Edison replied, "Tesla, you don't understand our American humor," thus breaking his word.[29][30] Earning a mere US$18 per week, Tesla would have had to work for 53 years to earn the amount he was promised. The offer was equal to the initial capital of the company. Tesla then immediately resigned when he was refused a raise to US$25 per week.[31]

Tesla, in need of work, eventually found himself digging ditches for a short period of time for the Edison company. He saw the manual labor as such a terrible job, but Tesla used this time to focus on his AC polyphase system.[22]
In 1886, Tesla formed his own company, Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing. The initial financial investors disagreed with Tesla on his plan for an alternating current motor and eventually relieved him of his duties at the company. Tesla worked in New York as a common laborer from 1886 to 1887 to feed himself and raise capital for his next project. In 1887, he constructed the initial brushless alternating current induction motor, which he demonstrated to the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (now IEEE) in 1888. In the same year, he developed the principles of his Tesla coil and began working with George Westinghouse at Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company's Pittsburgh labs. Westinghouse listened to his ideas for polyphase systems which would allow transmission of alternating current electricity over long distances.

In April 1887, Tesla began investigating what would later be called X-rays using his own single node vacuum tubes (similar to his patent #514,170). This device differed from other early X-ray tubes in that they had no target electrode. The modern term for the phenomenon produced by this device is bremsstrahlung (or braking radiation). We now know that this device operated by emitting electrons from the single electrode through a combination of field electron emission and thermionic emission. Once liberated, electrons are strongly repelled by the high electric field near the electrode during negative voltage peaks from the oscillating HV output of the Tesla Coil, generating X-rays as they collide with the glass envelope. He also used Geissler tubes. By 1892, Tesla became aware of the skin damage that Wilhelm Röntgen later identified as an effect of X-rays.

On 30 July 1891, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States at the age of 35. Tesla established his 35 South Fifth Avenue laboratory in New York during this same year. Later, Tesla would establish his Houston Street laboratory in New York at 46 E. Houston Street. There, at one point while conducting mechanical resonance experiments with electro-mechanical oscillators he generated a resonance of several surrounding buildings but, due to the frequencies involved, not his own building, causing complaints to the police. As the speed grew he hit the resonant frequency of his own building and,
belatedly realizing the danger, he was forced to apply a sledgehammer to terminate the experiment, just as the astonished police arrived.[55]
He also lit vacuum tubes wirelessly at both of the New York locations, providing evidence for the potential of wireless power transmission.[56]

In 1899, Tesla decided to move and began research in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where he would have room for his high-voltage, high-frequency experiments. Upon his arrival he told reporters that he was conducting wireless telegraphy experiments transmitting signals from Pikes Peak to Paris. Tesla's diary contains explanations of his experiments concerning the ionosphere and the ground's telluric currents via transverse waves and longitudinal waves.[63] At his lab, Tesla proved that the earth was a conductor, and he produced artificial lightning (with discharges consisting of millions of volts, and up to 135 feet long).[64] Tesla also investigated atmospheric electricity, observing lightning signals via his receivers. Reproductions of Tesla's receivers and coherer circuits show an unpredicted level of complexity (e.g., distributed high-Q helical resonators, radio frequency feedback, crude heterodyne effects, and regeneration techniques).[65]

Tesla may have suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder,[93] and had many unusual quirks and phobias. He did things in threes, and was adamant about staying in a hotel room with a number divisible by three. Tesla was also noted to be physically revolted by jewelry, notably pearl earrings. He was fastidious about cleanliness and hygiene, and was by all accounts mysophobic.

Tesla was obsessed with pigeons, ordering special seeds for the pigeons he fed in Central Park and even bringing some into his hotel room with him. Tesla was an animal-lover, often reflecting contentedly about a childhood cat, "The Magnificent Macak." Tesla never married. He was celibate and claimed that his chastity was very helpful to his scientific abilities.[22] Nonetheless there have been numerous accounts of women vying for Tesla's affection, even some madly in love with him. Tesla, though polite, behaved rather ambivalently to these women in the romantic sense.

Tesla was prone to alienating himself and was generally soft-spoken. However, when he did engage in a social life, many people spoke very positively and admiringly of him. Robert Underwood Johnson described him as attaining a "distinguished sweetness, sincerity, modesty, refinement, generosity, and force." His loyal secretary, Dorothy Skerrit, wrote: "his genial smile and nobility of bearing always denoted the gentlemanly characteristics that were so ingrained in his soul." Tesla's friend Hawthorne wrote that "seldom did one meet a scientist or engineer who was also a poet, a philosopher, an appreciator of fine music, a linguist, and a connoisseur of food and drink."

Close friend, Mark Twain in Tesla's lab.

Tesla was widely known for his great showmanship, presenting his innovations and demonstrations to the public as an artform, almost like a magician. This seems to conflict with his observed reclusiveness; Tesla was a complicated figure.

He refused to hold conventions without his Tesla coil blasting electricity throughout the room, despite the audience often being terrified, though he assured them everything was perfectly safe.

Tesla died of heart failure alone in room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel, on 7 January 1943.[100] Despite having sold his AC electricity patents, Tesla died with significant debts on the books.


#2 ^ "Electrical pioneer Tesla honoured". BBC News. 2006-07-10. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5167054.stm. Retrieved 2009-08-15.
#3 ^ "Nikola Tesla - electrical engineer and inventor". Serbian Unity Congress. http://www.serbianunity.net/people/tesla/index.html. Retrieved 2009-08-15.#4 ^ Valone, T. Harnessing the Wheelwork of Nature: Tesla's Science of Energy. Adventures Unlimited Press. pp. 102. ISBN 1931882045.
# 5^ Childress, David Hatcher (ed.) (2000). The Tesla Papers: Nikola Tesla on Free Energy & Wireless Transmission of Power. Kempton, IL: Adventures Unlimited Press. ISBN 0932813860.#6 ^ Robert Lomas (1999-08-21). "Spark of genius". Independent Magazine. http://www.robertlomas.com/Tesla/Independent_Article.html. Retrieved 2008-07-29.# 7^ White MJ (2001). Rivals: conflict as the fuel of science. London: Secker & Warburg. pp. 174. ISBN 0-436-20463-0.#8 ^ Cheney M (2001). Tesla : Man Out of Time. New York, NY: Touchstone. ISBN 0-7432-1536-2.#9 U.S. Supreme Court, "Marconi Wireless Telegraph co. of America v. United States". 320 U.S. 1. Nos. 369, 373. Argued 9–12 April 1943. Decided 21 June 1943.#22 Cheney, Margaret (2001) [1979]. Tesla: Man Out of Time. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0743215362. http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0743215362&id=ti2Jt7XarzMC. Retrieved 2007-06-17.#26 ^ "Master of Lightning" by Public Broadcasting Service. Website#27 ^ "Tesla Says Edison was an Empiricist. Electrical Technician Declares Persistent Trials Attested Inventor's Vigor. 'His Method Inefficient' A Little Theory Would Have Saved Him 90% of Labor, Ex-Aide Asserts. Praises His Great Genius.". New York Times. 19 October 1931. "Nikola Tesla, one of the world's outstanding electrical technicians, who came to America in 1884 to work with Thomas A. Edison, specifically in the designing of motors and generators, recounted yesterday some of ..."#28 ^ http://www.westegg.com/inflation/ Adjusting the reported given amount of money for inflation, the US$50,000 in 1885 would equal US$1,140,112.60 in 2007#29 ^ Clifford A. Pickover, Strange Brains and Genius: The Secret Lives of Eccentric Scientists and Madmen. HarperCollins, 1999. 352 pages. P. 14. ISBN 0688168949#30 ^ "My Inventions" by Nikola Tesla, printed in Electrical Experimenter Feb–June, 1919. Reprinted, edited by Ben Johnson, New York: Barnes & Noble, 1982. ISBN# 31^ Jonnes,"Empire of light" p. 110#55 ^ O'Neill, "Prodigal Genius" pp 162–164#56 ^ Krumme, Katherine, Mark Twain and Nikola Tesla: Thunder and Lightning. 4 December 2000#63 ^ Tesla, Nikola, "The True Wireless". Electrical Experimenter, May 1919. (also at pbs.org)#64 ^ Gillispie, Charles Coulston, "Dictionary of Scientific Biography"; Tesla, Nikola. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York. ISBN#65 ^ Corum, K. L., J. F. Corum, and A. H. Aidinejad, "Atmospheric Fields, Tesla's Receivers and Regenerative Detectors". 1994.#93 ^ Kerryr.net#100 ^ "Nikola Tesla Dies. Prolific Inventor. Alternating Power Current's Developer Found Dead in Hotel Suite Here. Claimed a 'Death Beam'. He Insisted the Invention Could Annihilate an Army of 1,000,000 at Once.". New York Times. 8 January 1943, Friday.

Sable Island: Shipwrecks & Wild Horses in the North Atlantic

Sable Island is a small Canadian island situated 180 km southeast of mainland Nova Scotia in the Atlantic Ocean.
The island is a narrow crescent-shaped sandbar with a surface area of about 34 km². Despite being nearly 42 km long, it is no more than 1.5 km across at its widest point. It emerges from vast shoals and shallows on the continental shelf which, in tandem with the area's frequent fog and sudden strong storms including hurricanes and nor'easters, have caused over 350 recorded shipwrecks. It is often referred to as the Graveyard of the Atlantic[3], as it sits astride the great circle route from North America's east coast to Europe. The nearest landfall is 160 kilometres to the northwest near Canso, Nova Scotia.


Sable Island was named after its sand—sable is French for "sand". It is covered with grass and other low-growing vegetation. In 1901, the federal government planted over 80,000 trees on the island in an attempt to stabilize the soil; all died. Sable Island is believed to have formed from large quantities of sand and gravel deposited on the continental shelf near the end of the last ice age. The island is continually changing its shape with the effects of strong winds and violent ocean storms. The island has several freshwater ponds on the south side between the station and west light and a brackish lake named Lake Wallace near its centre.

"The most famous, and perhaps the most popular, of Sable Island's fauna are the wild horses. Although access to the island is restricted - both by location and by regulations - the horses are well-known, and are of great interest, culturally and scientifically. The Sable Island horses have been featured in several documentaries and numerous books and magazine articles, and they were the subject of an exhibition at the Equine Museum of Japan in Yokohama (1994), and a photography exhibition in New York City (Roberto Dutesco, 2002). This population of horses has been the topic of doctoral research (Welsh 1975), and long-term studies have been underway since the mid-1980s (e.g. Lucas et al. 1991)."




"The romantic notion that Sable Island horses are descended from shipwreck survivors persists."


There are frequent heavy fogs in the area due to the contrasting effects of the cold Labrador Current and the warm Gulf Stream. During winter months, the moderating influence of the Gulf Stream can sometimes give Sable Island the warmest temperatures in Canada.





Green Horse Society
http://www.dutescoart.com/gallery/sablehorses/

Randoms: Death

Theta Nu Epsilon: Skull & Bones II

From the TNE site:

"The Society operated from 1870 to 1872 under the Skull & Bones Constitution, and existed happily as such as a chapter of that organization. It is not known what caused the break between Yale & Wesleyan; there are a number of possibilities, and a number of them may have contributed together to the separation. One of the most likely explanations is that Wesleyan sought to create more chapters, and Yale sought to stop the process. One thing is clear. Immediately after a constitution was adopted for the independent Theta Nu Epsilon in 1872, the first thing done was to issue a charter to a group of students at Syracuse. One can also note that the chartering process outlined in the constitution of 1872 was extremely short, and wholly under the control of the Alpha at Wesleyan."

"T.N.E. is a sophomore class society, and in a traditional type chapter, members were chosen near the end of their freshman or start of their sophomore year. Once selected, the new members were active and responsible for operation of the chapter during their sophomore year. As juniors and seniors, they were considered honorary members and only had authority in an advisory role. The society always excluded freshmen. From the beginning, the identities of the sophomore members were kept secret. In yearbooks, the names of the sophomores appeared in code. The Alpha Chapter and legitimate chapters continue this traditional type. Several latter types of chapters developed over time: one type is that of the three-year society, adopted by chapters at many institutions without a class society system, a third type was as a feeder organization to a senior society, a fourth type was where the chapter acted as an interfraternity coordinating body, and a fifth type was as a wholly secret society, (which were usually chapters that had notorious reputations)."



"Theta Nu Epsilon is simply a society dedicated to good fellowship and the exercise of those social practices that knit together succeeding generations and academic communities. Theta Nu Epsilon has no beliefs or credo, because it is not meant to supply the place of those institutions in society that do. Theta Nu Epsilon has no real or special secrets. Our initiation is challenging, dynamic, and possibly amusing, but it does not teach any truths any more significant, or any less so, than that one should be honorable, true to oneself, an upstanding member of the community, and should not forget to keep alive those social ties upon which we all must rely. Theta Nu Epsilon is not involved in any kind of political or social agenda. The Society can only exist as a point of union amongst its members if it remains a neutral ground of friendship, collegiality and nostalgic sentiment. Theta Nu Epsilon is designed for those who want more out of college, and who have more to give. Any attempt by anyone to pretend that Theta Nu Epsilon is anything more than this is a misrepresentation. Theta Nu Epsilon is not a cabal or a conspiracy, nor is it connected to any other organization, nor is it the tool or dupe of any conspiracy. Those who propagate such tall tales either, believe in such fantasies and are fools themselves, or they wish to make other people into fools and take advantage of them. Honesty and honor are the opposite of pretense."


Theta Nu Epsilon

The Commissioned Art of Michael J Deas

"Michael J. Deas is one of the nation’s premier illustrators, combining a "sense of grace and serenity" (in the words of Communications Arts Magazine) unrivaled by today's realists. His superb eye and phenomenal control of the oil medium has earned him numerous awards and citations, including four Gold Medals and one Silver Medal from the Society of Illustrators. His luminous redesign of the Columbia Pictures logo led to a feature article on the cover of America's leading graphics publication, Communication Arts, Sept/Oct 1998. The extensive story included more than 15 illustrations, highlighting portraits, advertising art, logos, editorial & book designs, and U.S. Postage Stamps."


My favorite. Earthbound

Hell House, novel by Richard Matheson, 1999

The Vanished Child, novel by Sarah Smith, 1995

The Empty Summer, 1993

Interview With The Vampire, Anne Rice

"His paintings have graced the cover of Time Magazine and more than a dozen postage stamps commissioned by the U.S. Postal Service. He is the artist behind two of the best-selling postage stamps in United States history, Marilyn Monroe and James Dean. In addition to painting numerous private portrait commissions, Deas has illustrated dozens of book covers, most notably the 25th-anniversary edition of Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire. The Columbia Pictures logo remains one of the most familiar icons in cinema history. Michael J. Deas is cited in Walt Reed's definitive history of illustration, The Illustrator in America, 1860-2000, and in 1999, his work was featured in major exhibition at The Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts."

Check out Deas site.

Cover Art: The Royal Scam

One of the greatest rock albums of the 1970s. I have always been fascinated by the album artwork though its hated by many... including the band.

The Royal Scam is an album by Steely Dan, originally released in 1976. The album went gold and peaked at #15 on the charts.
The album cover, which shows a somewhat well-dressed, possibly homeless, man sleeping underneath (or perhaps dreaming of) images of mutating skyscrapers, is a satirical take on the American Dream. The drawing and painting of the skyscrapers topped with various animal heads (snake, etc.), was considered dark, eerie, and gothic. The cover was designed by Larry Zox, and at least a portion was originally created for a Van Morrison album from 1974-75 that was never released. In the liner notes for the 1999 remaster of the album, Fagen and Becker claim it to be "the most hideous album cover of the seventies, bar none (excepting perhaps Can't Buy A Thrill).

Wewelsburg: Himmler's Occult Castle

Wewelsburg is a Renaissance castle located in the northeast of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, in the village of Wewelsburg which is a quarter of the city Büren, Westphalia, in district of Paderborn in the Alme Valley. The castle has the outline of a triangle. After 1934 it was used by the SS under Heinrich Himmler and was to be expanded to the central SS-cult-site. After 1941 plans were developed to enlarge it to the so-called "Center of the World".

The castle crew consisted of members of both SS branches, the "General SS" ("Allgemeine SS") and the "Armed SS" ("Waffen SS"). Also working at the castle were proponents of a kind of SS esotericism consisting of Germanic mysticism, an ancestor cult, worship of runes, and racial doctrines: Himmler, for example, adapted the idea of the Grail to create a heathen mystery for the SS.

Meetings of SS-Group Leaders at "spring conferences" were planned since 1939. Probably some talks took place at Wewelsburg Castle; the only documented meeting was in June 1941. Another source mentions three or four ceremonies a year of SS-leaders which took place at the castle.

In 1938 Himmler ordered the return of all Death's head rings of dead SS-men and officers. They were to be stored in a chest in the castle. This was to symbolize the ongoing membership of the decedent in the SS-Order. The whereabouts of the approximately 11,500 rings after the Second World War is unclear.


Where primary a cistern was a vault after the model of Mycenaean domed tombs was hewn into the rock which possibly was to serve for some kind of commemoration of the dead. The room is unfinished. The floor was lowered 4.80 meters. The fundament of the tower was firmed with concrete. In the middle of the vault probably a bowl with an eternal flame was planned. In the middle of the floor a gas pipe is embedded. Around the presumed place for the eternal flame at the wall twelve pedestals are placed. Their meaning is unknown. Above the pedestals wall niches existed. In the zenith of the vault a swastika (which ends run out in an ornamental way) is walled in. The swastika (Hakenkreuz) was understood as "the symbol of the creating, acting life" (das Symbol des schaffenden, wirkenden Lebens) and as "race emblem of Germanism" (Rasseabzeichen des Germanentums). The vault has special acoustics and illumination.

The axis of the sun wheel consisted of a circular plate of pure gold, which was to symbolize the center of the castle and thus the entire "Germanic world empire".

n 1938, Siegfried Taubert was in charge of developing the castle, when Himmler inquired about the cost of installing a planetarium[citation needed]. To round off the subjects taught at the Wewelsburg SS school a teacher was sought who should draw cross connections between astronomy and history and the folklife of the ancestors so that the historical and ideological schooling was to be enhanced and deepened by the "cosmic view" (kosmische Schau).

Footnotes at bottom.