Spark of Genius Page 3

not realising who Tesla was, assumed he was crazy, promised to ring him back and forgot about him. This was Tesla's last message to anybody. Quite ill by this time – his weak heart causing regular dizzy attacks – he was living in the Hotel New Yorker. On the evening of 5 January, he gave orders that he was not to be disturbed and went to bed. He often told staff to leave him undisturbed for two or three days at a time, but this was the last time he would be seen alive.

The story now unfolds like a bad thriller. Nikola Tesla died of heart failure some time between the evening of 5 January and the morning of 8 January when his body was found by a hotel maid.

On the night of 8 January, Sava Kosanovich (who, like many other refugees from Yugoslavia in the US, was under observation by the FBI as a possible spy) and two other men – George Clark and Kenneth Sweezey, a young science reporter – went to Tesla's hotel room with a locksmith to open his safe. Kosanovich told the other two men he was looking for Tesla's will. Three assistant managers of the Hotel New Yorker and a representative of the Yugoslavian consulate were present as witnesses. Sweezey took a book from the safe, and the safe was then closed and given a new combination that was revealed to Sava Kosanovich. If Kosanovich found a will he never produced it because Tesla is on the record as dying intestate. (Kosanovich, did, however, eventually collect together all of Tesla's remaining writings and technical equipment, which are now housed together in the Tesla Museum in Belgrade.)

On the same evening, Colonel Erskine, (by now realising exactly who Tesla was) called the FBI to tell them that Tesla had died and that his nephew had seized papers which might be used against the US government. The FBI made an immediate inquiry in New York, confirmed that Kosanovich and others had entered Tesla's room with the aid of a locksmith, and contacted the "alien property" custodian to retrieve the items seized.

Mr. Fitzgerald of Alien Property Control then went to the hotel and took away all of Tesla's remaining property, which consisted of about two truckloads. The articles were then sealed and transferred to the Manhattan Storage and Warehouse Co, NY, where other Tesla effects, a further 30 sealed barrels and bundles, had been stored by Tesla since 1934. The alien property custodian then seized all of Tesla's effects on Saturday morning, and called in naval authorities to make microfilm copies of all of his papers.

The FBI also discovered that Tesla had stored an invention in a safety deposit box at the Governor Clinton Hotel in 1932, but when agents tried to claim it, the hotel refused to release anything unless Tesla's unsettled bill was paid. The hotel did agree, however, to notify the FBI if anybody else tried to get at it.

... with my computer, scanner and modem ready to send and receive pictures and messages from around the world

FBI records state that Kosanovich was trying to gain possession of Tesla's effects, and that it was concerned that he might make this information available to the enemy. The FBI consulted the scientific advisor to Vice President Wallace, and was told to lose no time in doing whatever was necessary to preserve Tesla's effects. The FBI was also told that Tesla had completed and perfected his experiments in connection with the wireless transmission of power and had developed a new torpedo. The plans and a working model that cost $10,000 to build, were in the safety deposit box of the Governor Clinton Hotel. The model was connected with Tesla's "Death Ray" or the wireless transmission of electrical current.

The Bureau, ordered to keep the Vice President informed of what actions it took, decided to approach the state's attorney concerning the possibility of arresting Kosanovich on a burglary charge and therefore getting back the papers he had taken from the safe. At that point, the alien property custodian took over responsibility for the securing of Tesla's property and FBI records end.

A memo was sent out from J Edgar Hoover instructing that "all matters connected with the late Nikola Tesla are to be handled in a most secret fashion in order to avoid any publicity in respect to Tesla's inventions and that every precaution be taken to preserve the secrecy of those inventions."

So Tesla's life's work was declared "Top Secret" and discussion of it forbidden.

Ironically, Tesla's "Death Ray" was real, and it is only in the last few years that science has caught up with him. On 18 October 1993, the US department of defence announced that it was starting to build an experimental ionospheric research facility in Gakona, Alaska. This facility, known as Haarp (High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program), was built by the Raytheon Corporation and involves the universities of Alaska, Massachusetts, Stanford, Penn State, Tulsa, Clemson, Maryland, Cornell, UCLA and MIT in its programme of experiments to study the resonant properties of the earth and its atmosphere. The link with Tesla's work is clear. Haarp is studying exactly the same phenomena which Tesla first considered nearly 100 years ago.

Haarp is based on the ideas of Bernard Eastlund, who holds three US patents (4,686,605-4,712,158-5,038,664), all of which have been issued as improvements on the patents first issued to Tesla. The titles of the patents, which have to be shown to be practical before a patent is issued, are: method and apparatus for altering a region in the earth's atmosphere, ionosphere and/or magnetosphere; method and apparatus for creating an artificial electron cyclotron heating region of plasma; and method for producing a shell of relativistic particles at an altitude above the earth's surface.

This last patent, which describes an anti-missile shield which could destroy the electronics of hostile missiles or satellites, is the realisation of Tesla's "Death Ray". It works by creating a plasma packet of high-energy particles – Tesla's Colorado lightning experiments on a large scale.

So, on two counts, Tesla had the last laugh: his "teleforce" has finally been built and he won a patent battle with Marconi when, after he had been dead for six months, the US High Court confirmed it was Nikola Tesla who really invented radio. This was, of course, rather a hollow victory given that both patents had expired, both men were dead and nobody could talk about it because there was a top secret order forbidding discussion of Tesla's work.

The end result of this sad chain of events is that one of mankind's greatest benefactors is almost forgotten. Tesla died as he lived, alone, lonely and top secret, consigning himself to years of obscurity because of that last alarming offer to the US government.

He was a scientist of dazzling brilliance, a prophet who really did see into the future but was unrecognised in his own time. He was such an individualist, so self-centred that he never formed a close relationship with anybody, man or woman. Yet he was an enormously cultured: spoke many languages and was very well read. In his later years, he partly made his living by translating literature into Eastern European languages. But he never formed any lasting businesses or links with institutions which would have preserved a record of his inventions. Belgrade's Tesla Museum was only established long after his death.

Any chance of celebrating his life's achievements was lost by the panic that his death caused in wartime USA – his life's work filed as top secret by the FBI, US Navy and Vice President Wallace, and it is only now, almost 100 years later, that we can remember him openly. Tesla must have been a difficult man to work with, his workaholic attitude and his failure to suffer fools gladly would have meant that lesser engineers suffered from his tongue. But what a splendid companion he must have been at those dinner parties he held in his prime.

I sit here in my study utilising Tesla's legacy: lit by fluorescent electric light; heated by water pumped by an AC induction motor; listening to music broadcast on my mains-powered radio; my electric-powered computer by my side; my scanner and Internet modem on the desk, ready to send and receive pictures and messages from around the world.

As the sun sets over the Pennine hills, I look out on an array of Tesla's monuments carrying electricity around the country. In the distance I can see the megavolt cables of the National Grid strung between their high pylons as they hiss and crackle in the damp evening air. Across the valley runs a twin- stranded 11,000-volt local distribution line strung between its T-shaped wooden poles, and I can just see the transformer which drops the voltage to a safe 240 volts for the short cable run into my house. When you next see a line of electricity pylons carrying the power that grants you a civilised life, put one hand in your pocket and spare a moment to thank Nikola Tesla.

Tesla summed up his own life with these few words: "I continually experience an inexpressible satisfaction from the knowledge that my polyphase system is used to lighten the burdens of mankind and increase comfort and happiness, and that my wireless system, in all its essential features, is employed to render a service to and bring pleasure to people in all parts of the world." 'The Man who Invented the Twentieth Century: Nikola Tesla, Forgotten Genius of Electricity' is published on 2 September by Headline at £12.99