E XT IUOH DIXAHY T ORY OF .TOH X W ORRELL KEELY .

Bv j U LIUS 1\foR ITZEr

634 THE EXTRAORDINARY S70RY OF jOHN WORRELL KEELY.

has cut down the maker and his model. all this has furnished experts an opportu-As a result, perhaps, another life went out nity for advancing theories that neverthe-of its earthly sphere as well. For that less do not explain everything it is desir-Mrs. Bloomfield Moore was heatt and soul able to have explained. in the Keely project, the words of Henry When Clarence B. Moore, the son of the Dam, the eminent scientific write r, testify, late Mrs. Bloomfield Moore, came to the when he said, shortly after the d eath. that realization that the memory of 'his mother he had felt intuitively that when Keely was linked too closely with her interest in died Mrs. :Moore would not long survive. the Keely proj ect, to which he had persist-

It matters not a ently been an antag-great deal what was onist, he reso I ved the agency employed that now or never by Keely when in was the hour for ex-the act of demon- posing the trickery strating his "hydro- which he was con-pneumatic-pulsating- vinced lay at the bot-vacue engine." Was tom of the thing. it compressed air, Keely's house was hydraulic power or rented and investiga-electricity? There- tions were begun . cent exposures of L eading Philadel trickery on the prcm- phian scientists as-ises point strongly to sisted in the work, the former conject- and the first dis-ure, but t.he proba- covery came in the bility is that the ex- shape of an immense act modus operamli steel g lobe. Almost will never be abso- covered with dirt arid lutely established. rubbish, it was held

Bringing the his- down in the earth of tory of the Keely the cellar by heavy transactions d own to beams. When re the latl!st d evelop- lieved of its incnm ments, the removal brance, the sphere of the machinery was lifted out of its from the premises oc- resting-place, and cupied by the " in- s ubse quently was ventor'' stirred up found to weigh more matters as its remain- than three tons. On ing could never have the top of the globe ace om pi ished. In a hole was discovered the safekee ping of a and, screw-threaded. friend of Keely's, in the cavity gave 11 Boston, the motor ' s wider diameter the fut ure is as obscure farther penetrated. as if it had never TH F. TKANSMITTE K . Immediately near been contemplated by its e rstwhi le maker. the sphere was found an iron pipe which led But the scenes enacted at the vacated work- for a distance of more than fift een feet into shop; the exposures ; t he controversies; the violent persistency wi J which the investors still cling t.o probabilities t hat do not ~eem even possibili ties when viewed from an im-partial standpoint; the discovery of the hidden tubing, which came about immedi-ately following the removal of the motor-

the space under the front room. Here was di scovered a pit lined wi th wood and cov-ered by a trap-door. Fresh ashes gave evi-dence of a carefu l demoli1 Jn of material not thought "alua :Jc enougl, for removal, and yet necessa ry to ha v11 out of the way . In these ashes, however, were found short sec

THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF JOHN WORRELL KEELY. 635

tions of what at first was considered to be wire, but subsequently proved to be brass tubing. A large amount of glass tubes was likewise found in the debris. The fragments left behind gave striking evi-dence of the car~ exercised in removing the Keely motor machinery from its home.

The next day, still g reater results re-warded the searchers of the premises. The room in the rear was curiously raised above the others, and this was the apartment in which Keely conducted all those experi-ments which had puzzled the world until his rleath.

psychology at the University of Pennsyl-vania, and Mr. Moore, who had the investi-gation in charge, the nature of what had been laid bare now came in for earnest consideration. It was determined beyond a doubt that the tubing, and the spherical reservoir found in the ce! ~ ~r, stood conclu sively for the argument that compressed air might easi ly have accomplished all that had been demonstrated so mysteriously by Keely.

But before entering upon the more de-tailed account of what came of the ex-posure, it becomes necessary to revert to

"DISlNTRG RA TOR." AN D LEVER FOR MOVt NU T H E ENERG Y OF THE " DISIN TEG RAT E D " WATER.

When the floor was torn up, the revela-tion was complete. Through the joists, in holes specially cut for the purpose, ran a short brass tube. Other tubes were dis-covered al so, and the whole went to show that the motor had been connected here with the spherical contrivance in the cellar.

In the presence of Prof. Arthur W . Goodspeed, professor of physics at the University of P ennsylvania; Prof. Carl Hering, one of the most eminent e lectrical engineers in the country ; Prof. Light-ner Witmer, professor of experimental

the year 1872, the year when the K eely Motor Company was organized, and the enthusiasm anent the'' new force'' brought into the fold men whose very names at that period stood for common sense and perspicacity.

At the Fifth Avenue Hotel, New York city, a meeting was held, presided over by Edward B. Collier, a lawyer, who in his particular line of paten t attorney had from time to time come in contac t with inventors strug~ling for a hearing . The meeting was composed of bankers, mer-chan t!

636 THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF JOHN WORRELL KEELY.

and the result was satisfactory, from a Keely point of view. The project gained substantial assistance . :Money was sub-scribed, and the following day there was placed in the hands of Keely a check for ten thousand d ollars ; which , to do him justice, h e immediately expended for machinery, or material necessary for the cons truction of his peculiar apparatus. In fact , whatever the vagarieg of the man, however much his ideas may have been beyond the limit of common . euse, that

K~ely spent t.he money '~ hich he obtained in expcrinll'ntal investigations ca.nnot be d enied even by the most strenuous of his opponents at that time or now. Small c onsolation this, to the many who fell vic-tims to the smoothness of his speech or the incompreh ensible lang uage which h e em-ployed. .A.t any rate, after being launched, the motor project soon found it self in deep water. Funds lwgan to g-e t low, and bank-

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rupt cy followed. Lu ck ily, a friend now ap-peared on the scene. From one time to another, Keely' patron-es , frs.

Bloomfield Moore, who was left the execu-trix of her husband's will, advanced the '' iilYentor ' ' large sums out of the fortune accruing to her from the estute. Now and then a halt was called , to be sure, but the pcrsuasheness of the '' itwcntor ' would make her rally to his assista nce once more, and another lease of life would be accorded to the motor.

A grcat public exhibition was given in Philade lphia, but while enthusiasm ran riot among a ~ertain cligne, skeptics were plenty and t he pr rsisteney with which Keely would rcfnsc t.o admit a ny one into his secret caused a suspicion-which, neverthe-ltosf', did not preve nt a famous Phi ladelphia physician from advancing his individual cheek for t e n thousand dollars . This was in 18tH . In J 8 \JO the stoekholu ers began to gmmble, and something bad to be done to save the cause . Keely had just declared that he was on I he e ,e of success ; that an-other step wou lrl bring him to the thresh-old of tilt mystery that until then had been a mystrr_y even to him, he admitted. Again his remarkable forre of character saYed I he 1lay. The work was continued, and one machine followed another, only to be t brown asid e for some new contriv-ance de tined to assist in the re,olutioniz-ing of the ex isting order of things. As to what h1ul bren known ns the " genern tor," aml which had been part of a bath-tub, where a tream of wat er. passing through a goose-qui ll, set the contrha.nce in motion,

t he more sig nificant name

Gl.ASS C O:": TAISI XG \ VJ.: IG H T \VIli C H K EELY CLA I M E D Cot L n RF. M O V E D L" l-' O R 00\\. N U \ ' STRIKI :SG T H E Z IT IH~R STRIN G S

of '' liberator ' ' was now bestowed on the machine. A peculiar feature of the ' ' liberator '' was a series of tuning- fork s, wi th the vi-brations of which Keely claimed to disintegrate air and release an etheric force capable of rivaling a cy-clone in streng th if prop-erly utilized and applied . In explr.nation of what one visitor saw upon one oc-casion. thi s individual said that a pint of water poured into a cylinder seemed to work grea t wonders. The gage showed a pressure of more than fifty thou-

THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF fOHN WORRELL KEELY. 637

sand pounds to the square inch. Great ropes were torn apart . iron bars brok en in two or twisted out of shape, bullets dis-charged throug h twelve- inch planks, by a force which could not be uetermined .

In the g lory of his exuberance. Keely now declared that wi th one quart of wate r he would be able to send a train of cars from Philadelphia to San Francisco. and that to propel a steamship from N ew York to Liverpool and return, would require just about one gallon of the same.

I t was worth almost the price of fa.lling victim to hea.r Keely at the t ime theorize, expost ulate where it became necessary, and survey his aud ience wi th one of those

value to the man who had brough t the " invent ion" into the world. No matter h ow complicated the phraseology, they would allow for the possibili t ies in store.

Keely's excuse for not a llowing- any one in to his secret, was based upon the commer-cial value, which h e claimed h e d esired to have unimpa ired for th e benefi t of the stockholders. It surely would not do to reveal a secret that migh t pro,e its own financial defeat, he argued , wi th emphatic reverence for his own invention, and for the g lory and gain in store for those willing to abide their t ime.

The personality of J ohn Worre ll Keely was replete wi th the charm of heartiness.

K EF.l .. Y A ND BOA R D OF D IR ECT O R S OF T il E K I;E L\' 1\-JOT O K C0:\1P A N\' .

superior g lances which meant to illustrate that h e half pi t ied t hose who fa iled to tlll-derstand his vocabulary. In one respect he was scient ific in his procec1nre of expla-nat ion. and in other re~pec- t s he was quit e the reverse. Unquestiouuhly he had read considerably on th e sul1j ec-t of locomotion and kindrell matters. which migh t stand him in good stead. But wh en it came to " molecular vibrat ion. "sympathetic eq ui -lib rium, ' ' ' oscillat ion of t he atom. " "ethcric d isin tegrat ion," and a thousa nu and one similar terms for his motor force, the avera;re mind found its receptive powe rs hardly equal to the occa ion. Then it was that the fri ends of the motor sh owed th eir

His was the secret of the promoter's art. He had th e insigh t necessary to the man of affa irs. minus t hat quali ty of suhjection which tells it is t ime to cease before it is too late. And when considered in t his connection, that no one was ever tak en ab -solu tely into his confidence. it still remai ns a mystery how his following continue

638 THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF JOHN H'ORRELL KEELY.

come true, "etheric disintegration," "quadruple negative harmonics, " "atomic triplets,'' and the like, would have become part of the teachings in a new curriculum of its kind . But fate decreed otherwise. The "miracle" produced by the drawing of a bow across a string, whereby he claimed to harness or release the force of air and water, the "miracle" of controlling the elements, ceased to exist when he passed away.

secrets those regions might contain. But when it came to the demonstrating feature, the s

THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF jOHN WORRELL KEELY. 639

Between the engine and the transmitter ran a series of wires, and along the base of the transmitter au array of steel rods bristled like so many fixed bayonets ready to repulse the attacks of the incred ulous. These steel rods were responsive to the touch, and compared to the ordinary musical scale, which is subject to the tuning-fork.

The interior of the g lobe almost defied description, but out of the complex mass brass tubes and adhesive plates stood prominently. This was the shifting reso-

flow of talk about " finding a neutral center, '' and the like, the performance did not fail to do the work intended . But whi le the harmonica was supposed to have done the whole thing, starting up the ma-chinery by " ctheric force," the exposures recently brought about admit of the sup-posit ion that a concealed rubber bulb in the floor was the instrument used. K eely mig ht easily have shut off or released his compressed air by placing his foot on parts of the floor best known to him.

It might be taken for granted that the

OU N \ VITH \ \'HI C H K EE LY E XPE W.lt\:I ENTED AT SAND Y H OOK , AND OTHJ-;R APPLIANCES.

nator, as Keely tPrmcd it. The tubes and clement sti ll fa ithful to the apostle's plat es took up the vibratory sound and memory are not giving up without a strug-carried it along with rapiuiry. Of these g lc. They aver that the sphere found in vibrations there were seven distinct kinds, the cellar was known by them to be there. said Keely, and each of these seven capa- One enthusiast goes so far as to say that ble of infinit esimal division. he knew that Keely, having demonstrated

The motor it self consisted of a heavy his power in lifting the g lobe, reversed iron hoop, placed firmly on the plate. the experiment and pressed it down in the Within this hoop ran a drum with eight g round . The heavy beams, which held the spokes. When it was once in operation, the sphere in place, rather controvert such a movements of the drum were exceeding ly statement. rapid and did not fail to impress. Taken Since that midnight visit. to t he disman-in connection with Keely's simultaneous tied shop of the late John Worrell Keely,

640 THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF jOHN WORRELL KEELY.

the scientific opinions auvanced are of considerable importance, whether bearing upon his motor or his individuali ty. Renowned professors of physics have stated that they have Leen con vi need for years that the method was compressl'U air. A medical journal of hig h standing, in dis-cussing the matter from a psycholog -ical point. of view, says that rat her than make out a case anent Keely it were uet-

t~r to foll ow the psychological develop-ment of his dupes. Continuing. this j our-

of a good patent-right. He was not an h onest lunatic. He reaped substant.ial gain from his secrecy, for he ran a j oint-stock company.''

To a ll intents and purposes this stock company is still intact, but the action of the Keelyists did not. restrain one h older of a hundred shares of stock from d isposing of his certificates for a few dollars . The buyer could find a purpose even in the stock paper, h owever, for it went to the papering of his house . And now, while

GLOBE i\l OTOI< ANO P R O \ . IS IONAL E N G INE.

nal says that the psych ology of most. inventors usually brings them out. too soon rather than too late. ''Critics nnd scientists who may feel inclined to work out the problem of Keely's psycholog-y should re-member that insane inventors do not act in any way like Keely, ' ' is the exact l:w;rua!!e of this medical au thority . ''Their >