Nikola Tesla's Big Plant Nearing Completion

Several Buildings Being Erected at Wardenclyffe for the Installation of Machinery.

$150,000 BEING EXPENDED.

The Long Island Village to Be Made a Central Station for Sending of Messages All Over the World.

(Special to the Eagle.)

Wardenclyffe, L. I., October 5 — One of the most important undertakings ever entered upon in this section of Long Island is the establishment of the power and signal plant of Nikola Tesla, the Austrian electrical wizard of world wide fame. Mr. Tesla has purchased about 1,500 acres of land in this vicinity, comprising a large stretch of hills and valleys, wooded bluffs and fine beach, where he proposes to establish his great works from which he will place himself in communication with the most distant parts of the civilized world.

He has just finished his first building, a one story brick and iron structure, 94 feet square, located about 1,000 feet east of the Long Island Railroad station and 250 feet south of the main line. A laboratory and other buildings are also being erected and much of the plant is to be completed this month. Two 150 horse power boilers and a 250 horse power engine are now being installed, and the largest dynamo ever made, a machine of his own design. The current generated will be forced into receptacles of the inventor’s own designing and thence into the earth. Mr. Tesla proposes through the earth as a conductor to send messages to all parts of the world. Besides putting into effect his system of wireless telegraphy the inventor soon hopes to give to the world as a commercial commodity a new system of illumination by diffused light.

Mr. Tesla, speaking of his proposed enterprise at Wardenclyffe, said:

“The primary purpose of this plant is to transmit messages across the seas without wires.

“About two years ago I obtained in Colorado unmistakable evidence that such transmission can be made by my apparatus a commercial possibility.

“I am confident of success, but what gives me the greatest pleasure in this undertaking beside the successful issue of my theories is the extremely generous, I may say, noble financial support I have obtained. But for this I fear that many years would have elapsed before I would be able to carry out my undertaking.”

“What are the fundamental principles of your plan?” asked the Eagle reporter.

“They are perfectly well known through my patents in the United States and the principal foreign countries. It would be difficult to explain the theory popularly, but the salient features of the practical work of the system are a transmitter which magnifies the power of the vibrations many thousand times and sends them in all directions through the globe and the receiving circuit which is toned to the vibrations of the transmitter and which getting them through the medium of the ground, magnifies their power fully a quarter of a million times. The magnified vibrations are then transformed and made suitable to affect a receiving device of which I have invented a great number.”

“The plant proper for the transmission of messages will consist of a fireproof brick building, about 100 feet square, which is nearly completed and will contain the machinery and laboratory and workshop, which are indispensable. Close to this building will be the building containing the real transmission plant, which will be supplied with power from the first building. The work on this latter structure is being pushed as rapidly as possible. The vibrations will be transmitted to the ground. I shall establish independent connections at New York, Boston, Chicago and other places as soon as it becomes necessary.”

“How would your scheme of sending messages affect the vast investment in telegraph and telephone land and ocean wires all over the world?” asked the reporter.

“In regard to the cables, I expressed myself very strongly in the Century of June, 1900. I have dwelt on this subject in strong terms, so as to discount in advance the effect of the successful carrying out of my undertaking. I am aware that two Pacific cables are in process of construction. Great hopes have been placed on improved transmission through the cables and two methods have been proposed by brilliant scholars, but both are ineffective and absolutely inoperative.”

“Do you think Mr. Mackay will lay the Pacific cables in view of your discoveries?” asked the reporter.

“All I can say is I wish Mr. Mackay the heartiest success in his bold undertaking. He has been an important factor in the improvements effected in the past few years and but for a few such men there would have been no telegraph or telephone line.”

“How would you obviate the difficulty of the messages interfering with one another and how could you keep messages private?” was asked.

“This would be impossible but for a fortunate idea which presented itself to me some years ago and which I have been perfecting ever since. By the use of that principle I am able to absolutely isolate the message and to operate perfectly any desired number of receivers. I shall make this principle known very shortly.”

“How about the transmission of power?” was the next question put to the enthusiastic inventor.

“Of course that is one of the dominating problems and of inestimable importance. I have overcome all technical difficulties and am now ready to transmit immense amounts of energy, but for the large capital required for such an undertaking I am eager to demonstrate to the world that such a transmission is not a dream, but I must be patient.

“One of the most important undertakings I have had under consideration is the transmission of water power from Sweden to Great Britain. This has been my pet problem for many years and there is no doubt that as soon as its practicability can be perfectly demonstrated it will be taken up.

“Another scheme is the transmission of power from Niagara to New York City. This can be done in a perfectly practicable manner by a new system with bare underground conduits insulated from the ground by freezing around them. An enormous voltage, impracticable otherwise, can be used in this way and the loss in transmission would be scarcely more than one-fourth of 1 per cent.

“I will be out at Wardenclyffe soon. I must plan and make nearly all the machinery and appliances which have never been constructed before.”