Nikola Tesla FBI Files - Page 144

DEATH AND TRANSFIGURATION ← 264 required to stand at a distance, like the subjects of a neurotic Tudor (Pigeon germs did not seem to worry him.) He had heart trouble and suffered occasionally from fainting spells. No longer able to feed his beloved birds, he often relled upon a young man named Charles Hausher, who owned racing pigeons, to take care of them for him. Hausler had worked for Tesla in this capacity from around 1928 onward, his job being to go to the New York Public Library at noon each day with grain and then to walk around the four sides of the building looking for young or injured birds on window sills or behind large statues. He would take them to Tesla's hotel for rest and recuperation. Then, he has recalled, “I would release them at the Wbrary for him." He semembered that the cages in Tesla's rooms had been built by a fine carpenter— “as Mr. Tesla was in all his doings it had to be done right.” The pigeons also enjoyed a curtained shower Hauster and Tesla spent many hours together, talking mostly of pigeons. Once Tesla confided to him that "Thomas Edison could not be trusted." The boy remembered his employer as "a very kind and considerate human person," and there was one incident that stood out In his mind long afterward. “He had a large box or container in his room near the pigeon cages and he told me to be very careful not to disturb the box,” said Hausler, “as it contained something that could destroy an airplane in the sky and he had hopes of presenting it to the world." He believed it probably was stored in the cellar of the hotel_ On a bitter day in early January 1943, Tesla called his other messenger boy, Kerrigan, and gave him a sealed envelope addressed to Mr. Samuel Clemens, 35 South Fifth Avenue, New York City The boy set forth into the whipping wind and searched fruitlessly for the number. As it turned out, this had been the address of Tesla's first laboratory; but now South Fifth Avenue was West Broadway, and no one by the name of Samuel Clemens lived in the area. Kerrigan made his way back to the Hotel New Yorker and reported to the sick man. In a weak volcs, Tesla explained that Clemens was the famous Mark Twain and that everyone knew of him. He sent Kerrigan forth once more, and this time asked him also to take care of the pigeons. The perturbed messenger led the birds and then consulted his supervisor, who told him that Mark Twain had been dead for twenty-five years. Once again Kerrigan trudged through the cold afternoon to Tesla's moms, when he explained and tried to return the envelope. DEATH AND TRANSFIGURATION →→→→→→ 266 The inventor was Indignant and refused to hear that the humorist was dead. "He was in my room last night," he said. “He sai in that chair and talked to me for an hour. He is having financial difficulties and needs my help. So-don't come back until you have delivered that envelope." Once again the messenger went to his supervisor and together they opened the envelope. It contained a blank sheet of paper wrapped around twenty five-dollar bills-enough to help an old friend through a little fainting spell On the fourth of January, the inventor, although very weak, went to his office to make an experiment that George Scherff was Interested in. Scharff dropped in to help him prepare for it. The work was interrupted, however, when Tesla felt a recurrence of some sharp pains in his chest. Refusing medical aid, he returned to his hotel. Next day a maid came in and cleaned. As she left, he asked her to put the Do Not Disturb sign on his door to keep visitors away, and not to bother cleaning. The sign remained these the following day and the one after that. Early on the morning of January 8, Alice Monaghan, a maid, Ignored the sign and entered the apartment to find the Inventor dead In bed, his sunken, "emaciated face composed." Assistant Medical Examiner H. W. Wembly examined the body, placed the time of death as 10:30 P.M. on January 7, 1943, and gave his opinion that the cause of death had been coronary thrombosis. Tesla had died in his sleep. and the examiner noted that he had found “No suspicious circumstances. The inventor was eighty-six years of age. Kenneth Swezey was notified at once; and at ten o'clock that moming he telephoned to Dr. Rado at New York University King Peter's headquarters, then at 745 Fifth Avenue, was advised by the professor. Tesla's nephew, Kosanović, then wartime president of the Eastern and Central European Planning Board for the Balkan countries, also was notified. Then the FBI was called. Swezey and Kosanović summoned a locksmith and Tesla's safe was opened and the contents examined. The body was removed to the Frank E. Campbell Funeral Home at Madison Avenue and 81st Street and a sculptor was engaged by Hugo Gernsback to prepare a death mask of the inventor Just before Tesla's death, Eleanor Roosevelt had tried to Intercede in his behalf with President Roosevelt -perhaps with the idea of conferring some honor upon him. In the Tesla Museum at Belgrade three brief notes on White House stationery may be read. On 144 !?