When Tesla arrived in Colorado, he was impressed by the frequent lightning storm s in the area and he noticed that

during these storms the ground became electric ally charged. Tesla became convinced that the secret to broadcasting power was not the upper atmosphere, but the Earth itself. He believed that the planet was filled with electrical "vibrations" and that it wasn't even necessary to build up a charge in the Earth like a battery, but rather to simply send vibrations ou t from a single source. These would send electrical waves throughout the world that could be tapped with equal intensity anywhere simply by sticking a wire in the ground. It was also supposed to be able to power aeroplanes, but as to how it was going to do that Tesla was a teeny bit vague. Tesla's experiments at Colorado Springs were nothing if not spectacular. When h e cranked up his apparatus for the first time there were electrical discharges, a hundred feet long, claps of thunder that could be heard fifteen miles away, an d one dead generator at the local power plant, which Tesla managed to burn out a nd had to repair for free. For nine months he continued to try to create broadc ast power, but with very little to show for it. He was reported to have lit a s tring of lights at a distance and nearly electrocuted a few horse through their iron horseshoes, though this was most likely due to good old-fashioned ground co nductivity. In the end, he achieved a new scale in high voltage experiments, he may have created ball lightning, he may have observed ELF waves, he may even ha ve recorded radio waves from space, but he certainly took his investors for a so aking. Wardenclyffe In 1900, Tesla convinced J.P. Morgan to sink $150,000 in what Morgan thought was an improvement on wireless telegraphy. Tesla had pitched to Morgan the idea of a "World System" that would link together the four corners of the globe in an i nformation system that would make the Internet look like two cans and a bit of s tring. It would allow audio transmissions as well as Morse. It would perfect t elevision. It would synchronise all the world's stock tickers. It would regula te all the world's clocks and watches. It would carry telephony over any distan ce. It would provide governments with perfectly secure communications. Handwri tten documents, drawings, and photographs could be transmitted instantly. It wo uld provide pinpoint navigation. It would control machines across oceans. What it did on its days off was left to the imagination. What Tesla had not revealed to Morgan was that his World System wasn't really a communication network, but an improvement on his broadcast power scheme. Commun ication was just the gravy for the electrical pot roast. With his new system Te sla expected to broadcast power to any point of on the globe; this time by turni ng the Earth into a giant condenser with the ionosphere as one plate and the gro und as the other connected by electric channels formed by gigantic ultraviolet l amps beaming upwards. Or not. Tesla's notes aren't very clear and he seems to have been vacillating between three different theories as he went along. Since he was by now dreaming of using his broadcast power to control the weather and a bolish war, perhaps it's just as well that he kept practical-minded Morgan in th e dark. By 1901, Tesla was building his power broadcaster at Wardenclyffe out on Long Is land in New York State, which Tesla envisioned as the centre of a great industri al community tending his device. Next to his new laboratory rose a huge tower t opped by a fifty-ton steel sphere that was the heart of his transmitter. Unfortunately for Tesla, he grossly overestimated his ability to build his insta llation on what little money he could raise. When he went back to Morgan for mo re, he had the bad judgment to reveal to Morgan the true purpose of his World Sy stem and added to his lack of foresight by explaining to the great financier tha

t his system would turn the world into one gigantic brain of godlike intelligenc e. Needless to say, Morgan did not fork over any more gelt and in 1905 Wardencl yffe was sold off to pay Tesla's $20,000 in hotel bills at the Waldorf Astoria. Tesla never abandoned his dreams of revolutionising the world with his system, but investors were becoming much more wary of him and nothing came of it. One question is, how did Tesla think that his system would fit in with the devel opment of atomic power? Not much. Tesla regarded atomic power as purest nonsen se. Don't be ridiculous; won't ever happen. The one thing that you could never accuse Tesla of was being overly modest. He claimed that as early as 1898 he'd developed an electromechanical oscillator abo ut the size of an alarm clock that could apply minute taps at such a rate that i t could shatter a two-inch thick link of chain in short order. With the same de vice, he claimed that he'd nearly brought down a steel-framed building and that he could destroy the Brooklyn bridge inside of half an hour. In later years he asserted that he had a pocket version that could disintegrate the Empire State B uilding faster than you could say "cartoon super villain." Of course, this was small beer compared to his great scheme. Tesla said (in pub lic, mind!) that he could set up vibrations in the Earth sufficient to split th e planet "like an apple." He conceded that this might take several months, but he could at least peel the Earth's crust away like an orange rind (again with th e fruit metaphors) in a couple of weeks and that would do for the human race qui te nicely, thank you. Enough's as good as a feast, I suppose.