NICOLA TESLA:EARTHQUAKE IN MANHATTAN  
  
    An earthquake in Manhattan? Impossible--yet the earth quivered,  
buildings swayed,windows shattered and people rushed out into the   
streets, yelling in terror.A couple of policemen went puffing  up  
the stairs to Tesla's laboratory to make that "mad scientist" stop  
whatever he was doing.  
     Discoveries he made were so far ahead of their time that they  
are only now being developed; some have never been duplicated. He  
dropped his ongoing work in Teleautomation and computers to  rush  
on to his experiments with the electro-mechanical oscillators with  
which he created earthquakes."With this principle one could split  
the earth in half like an apple", he boasted. More practically, he  
predicted present-day methods for detecting oil and mineral depos-  
its.  
     Throughout the neighborhood there were many loft buildings   
ranging from five to ten stories in hight, and occupied by many  
factories of all kinds.Sandwiched between them were the small tena-  
ment houses of a densely packed Italian population. A few blocks to  
the south was Chinatown, a few blocks to the west was the garment   
trades area, a short distance to the east was a densely crowded  
tenament-house district. It was in this highly variegated neighbor-  
hood that Tesla unexpectedly demonstrated the properties of sus-  
tained powerfull vibrations. The oscillator, attached to a supporting  
pillar of the structure; (the device had been operating in the back-  
round while he worked on his other projects), was slowly building   
up vibration. He noticed that every now and than some heavy piece of  
machinery would vibrate sharply and the floor  underneath him would  
rumble for a second or two-that a window would sing audibly, and  
other similar transient events would happen--all of which were quite  
familiar to him. These observations told him that his oscillator was  
tuning up nicely.  
      Things were not going so well in the neighborhood, however.  
 On this particular morning the police were surprised to feel the  
 building rumble beneath their feet. Chairs moved across the floor  
 with no one near them. Objects on the officers desk danced about  
 and the desks themselves moved. It must be an earthquake! It grew  
 stronger. Chunks of plaster fell from the ceilings. A flood of   
 water ran down the stairs from a broken pipe. Some of the windows  
 shattered.   
      "That isn't an earthquake, it's that blankety-blank Tesla!"   
 shouted one of the officers. Get up there quickly and stop him.  
 And use force if you have to, but stop him. He'll wreck the city."  
       Pouring into the streets were scores of people leaving nearby  
 tenament and factory buildings, believing an earthquake had caused  
 the smashing of windows, the breaking of pipes, moving of furniture  
 and the strange vibrations.   
     Without waiting for the slow-pokey elevator, the police rushed   
up the stairs. There was a sense of impending doom--that the whole   
building would disintegrate--and their fears were not relieved by  
the sound of smashing glass and the queer roars and screams that  
came from the walls and floors. Maybe he was making the whole earth  
shake in this way! Would this man be destroying the world? It was  
destroyed once before by water. Maybe this time it would be   
destroyed by that agent of the devil that they call electricity!  
      Just as they rushed in to tackle--they knew not what--the   
vibrations stopped and they beheld a strange sight. They arrived  
just in time to see the tall gaunt figure of the inventor swing a  
heavy sledge hammer and smash a small iron contraption mounted on  
the post in the middle of the room. Pandemonium gave way to a deep  
heavy silence. "Gentlemen," he said, "I am sorry, but you are just  
a trifle to late to witness my experiment. I found it necessary to  
stop it suddenly and unexpectedly and in an unusual way just as   
you entered."  
      Tesla never told the story beyond this point. Imagination  
must furnish the finale to the story.  
      Tesla was quite sincere in his attitude. He had no idea of  
what had happened elsware in the neighborhood as a result of his   
experiment. When he learned the details, however, he was convinced  
that he was correct in his belief that the field of mechanical   
vibrations was rich with opportunities for scientific investigation.     

  
  
      From: "PRODIGAL GENIUS The Life and Times of Nicola Tesla"  
            Overseas edition for the Armed Forces distributed by  
            by the Special Services Division for the Army, and  
            for the Navy.  
            This edition is not available to the general public  
            but a new edition under the same title has recently  
            been released and can be bought at better book stores.