Nellie Bly

Pittsburg Dispatch/May 3, 1885

The Electrical Age

Great Wonders of Electricity to be Realized Before Many Years

The possible applications of the principle of the electrical transmission of power are almost numberless. We shall, an electrician believes, at no distant date, have great central stations, possibly situated at the bottom of coalpits, where numerous steam engines will drive many electric machines. We shall have wires laid along on every street, the electricity in each house, and the quantity of electricity in each house registered as gas is at present. The storage battery will fill a place corresponding to the gas meter in the gas system, making the current steady, rendering the consumer independent of the irregular action or stoppages of the dynamos of the central station, and enabling the use of dynamics of the highest tension—i.e., those which produce the currents of the greatest intensity. The electricity will be passed through little electric machines to drive machinery to produce ventilation, to replace stoves and to work all sorts of apparatus, as to give everybody an electric light. Solar heat will be used to run the dynamos in the cloudless regions. Everywhere the power of the tides and such waterfalls as Niagara are to be utilized. It is not a millennium to be anticipated when the water power of a country shall be available at every door?

Steam, which in the last century has conferred so many benefits on the world, will give way before electricity. The dynamo will replace the steam engine. This prediction seems wild and visionary, yet when steam was first thought of as an available force its advocates were considered, just as the advocates of dynamical electricity today are considered, mere enthusiasts. But public opinion never stops the march of intellect. After it had proved the powers of steam to be enormous, genius never halted, but straightaway went on anticipating still more wonderful discoveries in the realms of electricity.

The prophetic ken of science was happily exhibited by Dr. Lardner, in his treatise on the steam engine. “Philosophy,” said he, half a century ago, “already directs her fingers at sources of inexhaustible power in the phenomena of electricity and magnetism, and many causes combine to justify the expectation that we are on the eve of mechanical discoveries still greater than any which have yet appeared, and that the steam engine itself, with the gigantic powers conferred upon it by the immortal Watt, will dwindle into insignificance in comparison with the hidden powers of nature still to be revealed, and that the day will come when that machine which is now extending the blessings of civilization to the most remote skirts of the globe will cease to have existence except in the page of history.”

Today we are beginning to appreciate the truth of this philosophy. Today we see dynamical electricity in the forefront of the physical sciences. The principle of the transmission of power by electricity fast approaches its realization. We are, in truth, just entering upon a wonderful age.

A True Cat Story

A few miles from the city of Pittsburg is a Maltese cat that is well worth the keeping. Her first kitten, which is now six months old, is a rabbit all but the head—feet, tail, fur or a rabbit with a cat’s head. It is the best rat-catcher in the neighborhood. It does not walk, but hops rabbit-like. The second litter had rats’ heads and forelegs. There were two of these. A third one was half a bat. Its feet were webbed, wings were attached to its sides, while a cat’s head and tail finished off the queer monstrosity. The owner had both these flocks killed, fearing bad luck if she attempted to raise them. The rabbit-cat is still in her possession. No sum of money would induce her to part with it. The Maltese mother is very wise, and apparently understands every word addressed to her.