The Tesla Files: Without a Trace - Full Episode (S1, E1) | History

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♪ ♪ -(mechanical whirring) -MAN: You're good. -You're good! -You're clear! NARRATOR: August, 2017. -Oh, this is good right here. -All right, buddy. NARRATOR: On a private ranch located 40 miles west of Colorado Springs, astrophysicist and aerospace engineer Dr. Travis Taylor is about to replicate an incredible scientific experiment. Let's get a volt meter, and let's connect it up to the tap on the secondary. NARRATOR: One that was first performed by a mysterious scientific genius more than 100 years ago. Hold those two black wires, and we'll pull these wires tight. NARRATOR: Assisting him is investigative journalist Jason Stapleton, along with members of a local research team. -We're good to go. -Well, let's make something glow, man. I'm ready. NARRATOR: Travis and Jason are investigating the mysterious disappearance of literally thousands of secret files that belonged to scientific visionary Nikola Tesla. And we're gonna use these two light bulbs. NARRATOR: If their experiment is successful, they will have proved Tesla's theory-- that electric power can be transported wirelessly by using the soil in the ground as a conductor. They will also be one step closer to proving that not only were Tesla's theories decades -ahead of their time... -All right, guys, bring it up! ...but that the mysterious disappearance of his files was part of a plot to discredit him... Arming the system now! NARRATOR: ...and keep his discoveries hidden from the public. Three, two, one. (electricity buzzing) -(laughter, cheering) -Okay! We did it. -Boom! STAPLETON: To see the light bulbs come on, to understand that we are helping to validate a science that's been lost is powerful. That is awesome! TAYLOR: Albert Einstein said that Tesla was the smartest man on the planet, and we actually reproduced one of his experiments today. You can bring it down, guys! What else was in those missing files and all those trunks he had? How many inventions and ideas and concepts might have been in there that we really need to look at and figure out just what doors they might open? (thunder rumbling) NARRATOR: Shortly before he died, alone in a New York hotel room, scientist and inventor Nikola Tesla claimed to have 80 trunks filled with his life's work-- everything from detailed plans for wireless electricity to weapons so powerful they could destroy entire cities. But after he died, only a few of Tesla's 80 trunks were reportedly found. For decades, people have wondered what happened to the files contained in Tesla's missing trunks? Could they have contained secrets? Secrets that could forever change the world? On July 7th, 2017... Park right here. ...Dr. Travis Taylor and Jason Stapleton traveled to Washington, D.C. They had come to meet with author Marc Seifer, whose decades of research into the life and works of Nikola Tesla have made him one of the world's leading experts on the subject. -Grab a seat. -Yeah. When I first encountered Tesla, I read a book which said that Tesla was the inventor of the induction motor, hydroelectric power system, fluorescent neon lights, remote control, robots, particle beam weapons. He had cell phone technology in 1901. I couldn't believe it. NARRATOR: Born in 1856 in the small village of Smiljan, Croatia, Nikola Tesla went on to have a career that spanned two centuries. He developed everything from alternating current and wireless communication to remote weapons systems. Today, Tesla is credited with developing everything from energy-efficient automobiles and remote-controlled vehicles to fluorescent lighting, X-rays and even cell phones. But in his own time, Tesla and his theories were often dismissed as "outlandish," "ridiculous," or just plain "crackpot." Better-known inventors like Thomas Edison actively worked to discredit him. But why? Could it be that Tesla's incredible theories were considered a serious threat to the status quo? So, what I did was I used the Freedom of Information Act, and I wrote to the FBI, I wrote to the CIA, wrote to the National Archives, and I started to get a lot of information. For instance, in 1984, I wrote to the CIA, and it says, "We searched our files "for information or records concerning Tesla. We're unable to identify any records." So, they're telling me they don't have anything. Now, the reason why I called you in is because the CIA has just declassified documents, and it mentions Tesla in the second paragraph. NARRATOR: On January 17, 2017, during the last days of the Obama administration, the CIA announced the release of over 12 million declassified documents onto its Electronic Reading Room. For government conspiracy theorists, the document dump represented a treasure trove of previously-hidden information, covering everything from UFO sightings to former national security issues. SEIFER: It says, "In a recent conference "dedicated to Nikola Tesla and his work, the papers presented claim some of Tesla's concepts." And then the rest is blacked out. It's redacted. So, here it is that they clearly have a file on Tesla. I see that as a lie. They didn't want anybody to know, for whatever reason, in 1980s, but here in 2001, it's clear the CIA had a classified interest in Tesla. NARRATOR: As a leading expert in the fields of optical science and aerospace systems engineering, Travis Taylor has worked on numerous top-secret programs for both NASA and the Department of Defense. Tesla invented almost everything that brought forward our modern society with electrical power, and he has almost no credit for that. It's like he's been erased from history and the textbooks. Travis, do you know what these security clearance markers are on this document? Yeah. Uh, so, here at the top, they tell you it's "confidential/NOFORN." Right off the bat, that tells me this is old, because we don't really use "confidential" anymore, and... -What is "NOFORN"? -"NOFORN" means "no foreigners." No foreigners are supposed to be given the information that was in it. There are classifications where it could be secret, but we could show it to our allies. This means we're not showing it even to our allies. STAPLETON: You know, Marc, it wouldn't surprise me at all, just knowing what I know about government, that they're suppressing information and hiding documents and refusing to be forthcoming. NARRATOR: Like Travis Taylor, Jason Stapleton has firsthand experience when it comes to matters of U.S. security and secrecy. Before becoming an investigative journalist, he was a member of the elite Marine Force Reconnaissance. No, government doesn't throw me off. They can be abrasive, they can act really scary, but when you've been on the inside and you kind of understand how it operates, it becomes much less of a scary environment and something that really you just need to learn how to navigate. Marc, is this it? Is this all we have to look at? I'm looking at discrepancies in the FBI files and other files that I have. For instance, in one file, it says that Tesla has 80 trunks. But for some odd reason, when Tesla died, it says in the FBI files that he had 30 trunks. So, there's trunks that are missing, so I want to find out about that. NARRATOR: On January 8, 1943, at the height of World War II, a frail and reportedly penniless Nikola Tesla was found dead at the age of 86 in the bedroom of his suite on the 33rd floor of the New Yorker hotel in New York City. But although the death was determined to be caused by a blood clot to the heart, there was evidence that someone had taken important materials from Tesla's safe and his rooms shortly before his body was discovered by a hotel maid. They wait three days before they go into somebody's room, so he could have been dead for three days. If the FBI or the OSS was monitoring him, they could have snuck in. They could have gone through his stuff, removed what they thought of as important documents. That adds a whole different spin to this entire story. NARRATOR: But if, as the FBI files stipulate, there were 80 trunks filled with the sum total of Tesla's discoveries, how was it that only 30 trunks were reportedly found after his death? I have to tell you, this one document you showed me alone is enough to intrigue me, so I'd like to dig in, see what we find. -Great. -Where do you want to start? I want to get to Belgrade because all of Tesla's stuff is in Belgrade right now. They've got a 100,000 documents. -Really? -100,000. -In Serbia? -In Serbia. NARRATOR: One week after their fateful first meeting in Washington, D.C., author Marc Seifer, investigative journalist Jason Stapleton and astrophysicist Dr. Travis Taylor, along with Tesla Science Foundation board member Tim Eaton have traveled some 250 miles east of Tesla's birthplace of Smiljan, Croatia to Belgrade, Serbia. They have arranged to visit the Nikola Tesla Museum in search of what they believe to be a large number of missing trunks that were stolen at the time of Tesla's death. Here we are, guys. Wow. -Here's your man. -Hello, Marc. Glad to see you. -Branimir! -Good to see you. -Welcome. We are very proud to-to have this institution here. For me, this is a sacred place. This is an incredible moment. -Okay. This way? -TAYLOR: Sounds great. -Thank you very much. -Here we are. This'll be exciting. Thanks. NARRATOR: In addition to a large number of Tesla's papers and personal effects, the museum houses artifacts and exhibits which demonstrate his trailblazing inventions, including a Tesla coil, a remote-controlled boat, and what is widely regarded as his most significant scientific invention, the alternating current induction motor, an innovation that still serves as the basis for how virtually all of the world's electrical energy is distributed. But of all of Tesla's personal items on display, perhaps the one of greatest interest to investigative journalist Jason Stapleton is the inventor's personal safe. STAPLETON: (chuckles) Look at that. TAYLOR: Wow. This is exciting, -to see this. -STAPLETON: Incredible. So, now, where was this at, originally? In the New Yorker. Okay. NARRATOR: Because much of Tesla's research had national security implications, especially during World War II, upon the scientist's death in 1943, all of his property was handed over to a U.S. government agency known as the Office of Alien Property Custodian. The move was a curious one. Even though Tesla was born in Croatia, he was a fully naturalized American citizen and, as such, was not an alien at the time of his death. Nevertheless, after an allegedly careful review of his files and other belongings, everything known to be in Tesla's possession was packed up and sent to the Manhattan Storage and Warehouse Company, where it remained until the scientist's nephew, Sava Kosanovic, arranged for all the items to be sent to the Tesla Museum in Belgrade. So, when he died, did they open the safe up? Did they itemize the things that were in there? Yeah. We know that there were two things missing for sure. There was the Edison Medal, and there was a set of keys. And we think that perhaps other papers were missing, because this safe was held by the FBI, the War Department for nine years. STAPLETON: That's interesting. As we went through the records, we found some discrepancies on how many trunks he had and how many that were given to the FBI versus how many were... supposedly came here. 'Cause this safe came with a bunch of other trunks of his documents. Do you know just off the top of your head, like, how many trunks you guys have, how many trunks you received? Sixty. NARRATOR: 60 trunks? But the government's own agent reported that only 30 trunks were collected from Tesla's hotel. And Tesla himself claimed to have 80 trunks filled with scientific files. Could these disparities be further proof of a cover-up? The 60 trunks that you guys have, are they on site here? Do you have 'em here? Can-can we look at 'em? Conservation? Okay. Um, there's some big gaps in his research. And for a guy who kept, like, little scratch pieces of paper as notes, does it seem probable that there are then some things missing because of that? No. No, I'm not. No. -I'm not sure I know. -Well, let me... let me ask you... Let me go just one level deeper on that. We were told in some of the writings that we read about Tesla there were 80 trunks. It's a document... Did he not? SEIFER: In the FBI files, they mention 80 trunks, and you guys had 60. No. And-and we don't know. And, yeah, that's-that's really why we're here, is that we don't know. Yeah. And I think you make a good point, because that's... I'm-I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I'm a facts guy. We meet the director of the museum, Branimir, and, immediately, I get a very Cold War vibe from him. Like, he-he is elusive, and... he came right over the top of me, really aggressive. And it was odd, because you wouldn't think that a guy who just had a genuine interest in Tesla would be frustrated by the fact that, maybe, there's a discrepancy about all the information that we've got. It was something I was not expecting. SEIFER: I think there are a couple of facts, for sure. -Tesla says in the 1930s to the... -Okay. to the War Department in London, "I built a particle beam weapon -able to send out particle beams." -STAPLETON: Ah. -Yeah, yeah. -What ever happened to this weapon? He sent... To the War Department in London. Winston Churchill's people. NARRATOR: In 1934, Tesla announced that he had perfected and built a particle beam energy weapon called Teleforce, which, the scientist claimed, could use concentrated bursts of energy to shoot down as many as 10,000 enemy planes from a distance of 250 miles away. Although nicknamed "the death ray" by the press, Tesla insisted that his was a device that could put an end to all war. But if the so-called death ray actually existed as Tesla himself claimed, then why is the director of the Tesla Museum in Serbia insisting it didn't? TAYLOR: That's why we're here, right? We want to see the things that everybody hasn't seen. And the question is, are there documents that have more of these details in them? Yeah, let's-let's do it. Let's do it. ♪ ♪ This is the heart of the museum, the place where we are keeping the... NARRATOR: Armed with newly released information from declassified FBI files, Nikola Tesla biographer, Marc Seifer, along with astrophysicist, Travis Taylor, and investigative journalist, Jason Stapleton, and researcher, Tim Eaton, are investigating a serious discrepancy involving a number of the inventor's mysteriously missing trunks and the literally thousands of scientific documents which would have been contained within them, documents that might contain designs for everything from the global transmission of wireless energy to weapons so destructive that they would rival the atomic bomb. Are we allowed in there? Let's go. -That'd be great. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. -Yes. Beautiful. Yeah. -These were taken at the... when they arrived. -Yes. STAPLETON: It looks like these were originally upstairs. Yes. Yeah. Okay. That was... -We were just there. Okay. -Yeah. STAPLETON: All right. That-That's the manifest, right? Can you open it so we can see, kind of... -SEIFER: Oh, so it's a list of all the items. -WOMAN: Yes. Yes. So, they made a... they made a quick list first, and then they have a very detailed list -that went in behind. Okay. -So, we got a look at a few pages of the manifest. We got a look at some pictures of the trunk. And that's a nice start, it was nice to have that, but we've got to go a whole lot deeper than that if we really want to paint a clearer picture. So, what document is this now that we're looking at? 1935. So, this is Amtorg Trading Company, uh, which was an arm of the Soviet Union at the time. NARRATOR: After unsuccessfully offering Teleforce to both the U.S. and Great Britain in 1934, Nikola Tesla began negotiations with the Soviet Union, who reportedly paid him $25,000 for it in 1935. "The party of the first part agrees to pre-pay, deliver "within a period not to exceed four months." TAYLOR: So, it was $25,000 in 1935. Right? That-That's a significant amount of money -in that time frame, during the Depression. -Yes. And so this was clearly gonna be a big project for the Soviet Union. NARRATOR: But if Tesla was successful in selling Teleforce for such a considerable amount of money, especially at the height of the Great Depression, then why was he still living in relative poverty at the time of his death in 1943? Are there signatures on this document? Can we see the signatures? -Oh, we can't see the last p... -No, no. Why can't Marc, Travis and Jason see Tesla's signature? Does Tesla Museum director, Branimir Jovanovic, have something to hide? I'm staring right there at page one, and I want to see it-- I'm also a handwriting expert-- I want to see the signature page, I want to see Tesla's signature. Is Tesla's signature on the last page? Oh, okay. SEIFER: I certainly was let down. Here I am, I've traveled all the way to Serbia, and I want to see the signature page of a contract, and I'm not able to see it. STAPLETON: It's more than frustrating to travel halfway around the world to someplace like Serbia-- for them to know that we were coming, for them to know that we were making this expense to come here to see these documents, and for them to be unwilling to show us what they knew we wanted to see, it says a lot, it tells me something. NARRATOR: Could it be that Tesla's signature is a forgery, or that someone other than the famed scientist actually made the sale and collected the money? Or did forces within the United States government intervene and keep Tesla from actually going through with the sale, even though the museum claims to have signed evidence to the contrary? There are those who believe the plans for Teleforce were just one of many scientific secrets that the U.S. government was eager to retrieve from Tesla's hotel room in the days both before and after the scientist's death. They must have believed there was something significant to Tesla's death ray concept. The question is, if he was actually successful in creating a death ray that could do all the things that Tesla claimed they could do, you would think, well, then why aren't they in the trunks, in the vault, somewhere, in a library? Maybe they're not there for a reason. I would think that our government would have taken them and would have classified them, and it would become a secret weapon. NARRATOR: Although the team's visit to the Tesla Museum was well worth the long trip, they are now left with more questions than answers. OR: Nikola Tesla emigrated to the United States in June 1884, a time when the country was eager to find new ways of generating and using electricity in order to power what would become known as the Second Industrial Revolution. After a brief stint working in New York for Thomas Edison's company, he began developing and patenting his own ideas and inventions, most notably his 1887 design for an induction motor, which ran on alternating current, instead of the more common but less efficient direct current system, which was prevalent at the time. But despite Tesla's acknowledged genius in the field of electricity, he was plagued by a quarrelsome and suspicious nature. Over the years, he made a number of rich and influential enemies, including rival scientist and inventor, Thomas Edison, and powerful financier, J.P. Morgan. But recently released FBI files suggest that not everyone dismissed Tesla's theories as farfetched. There were, in fact, forces within the U.S. government who took Tesla's work very seriously-- although they publicly claimed otherwise. These papers are extraordinary. I mean, if I sound too excited, it's 'cause I am excited. This is the Trump report, and it's signed by John G. Trump. And you're not gonna believe this-- this is President Trump's uncle. -No kidding? -Yeah. It is crazy. John G. Trump? The uncle of Donald Trump, the 45th president of the United States? At the time of Tesla's death in 1943, during the height of World War II, Trump, a highly respected electrical engineer and physicist, had been working for the National Defense Research Committee, an organization dedicated to scientific research for matters of warfare. It was for this reason that the U.S. Office of Alien Property Custodian assigned John G. Trump to gather up all of the deceased scientist's belongings. But despite retrieving what Tesla claimed were 80 trunks filled with scientific papers, Trump claimed only 30 trunks were found at Tesla's hotel. And these, according to his report, contained nothing of strategic importance or scientific value. But how was this possible? Did John G. Trump lie about just how many trunks were actually recovered, and the value of their contents? Or was the discrepancy part of a larger strategy to keep the value of Tesla's missing files a secret? So, what else you got? I got another paper from the FBI which talks about a safe in Tesla's room, which we know about, that had valuables in it, including important electrical formula designs in "wireless transmission of electrical power had been completed and perfected." -"Completed and perfected"? -Yes. -Where? -Colorado Springs is where Tesla did his experiments in wireless transmission of power. That's where he really perfected it. He claimed he sent impulses around the world, and I'd like you to try and replicate his experiments and see if you can light light bulbs, -if we can do remote control. -Sure. TAYLOR: I believe that Trump's evaluation of Tesla's documents, that there was nothing of scientific value is wrong. And the only way I can think of to prove that is to go and conduct some experiments, just like Tesla did, out in Colorado Springs. It just makes sense that if he was doing research out there and he was conducting experiments, that there's stuff out there. NARRATOR: In 1895, Nikola Tesla was living in New York City, and, not for the last time in his life, was short on money. He believed he was being spied upon by jealous competitors, so much so that when a fire broke out in his New York City laboratory, the Serbian-born scientist suspected arson. Tesla became obsessed with the notion of moving his laboratory far away from the cramped and crowded environments of an eastern metropolis, to a place that would offer him room to build bigger and more powerful equipment, a place far away from what he believed to be prying and ignorant minds. He found that place in Colorado Springs. TAYLOR: I'm real excited about being here. Yeah, this was the starting point. -Yeah. -NARRATOR: Travis Taylor and Jason Stapleton have traveled some 1,600 miles... to Colorado Springs. Joining them is Travis's friend and research assistant, Kyle Davis. So, Travis, what are we trying to achieve? Well, the scientific community has put Tesla and his work -into a fringe category... -Right. -Yeah. but we don't really know what he was doing, because there are these missing files. NARRATOR: It was here in Colorado that Nikola Tesla claimed that he had successfully harnessed and amplified the electrical energy contained in nature, -(thunder crashing) -and was able to transmit it wirelessly to any point of his choosing. Unfortunately, because of Tesla's penchant for secrecy, there were virtually no witnesses to verify his findings. TAYLOR: Very few people have actually done detailed, rigorous scientific evaluations of his ideas. -Okay. -So we've gathered everything we can from interviews and documents, whatever, and we're going to do our best -to reproduce his experiments. -Got it. NARRATOR: Travis has arranged to meet with electrical energy experts, Justin Hays and Drew Eby, from Applied Tesla Tech, Inc. -Hey, fellas. -Hey, guys. They are preparing to recreate one of Nikola Tesla's most audacious and groundbreaking experiments. Well, let's start talking about what we gotta do to get this experiment rolling. Well, we're pretty far along so far. Yeah, looks cool. Tell us about what you got. -It's a couple of really big Tesla coils. -How big? Oh, about 25 kilowatts big. NARRATOR: They will attempt to remotely power a small electric boat by using a pair of Tesla coils located on the shore. A Tesla coil is an electrical resonant transformer that, depending on its size, can significantly amplify electrical energy. This is our boat we're currently working with here. Um, we took out the batteries from the inside. See, where's the motor that drives the prop? -That's this right here, right? -Yes. And then this thing back here, I'm guessing, is the rudder. -This is how we're gonna steer it? -Yup. All right, so we're gonna do that wirelessly, but not through the Tesla coil, like Tesla did, right? -Yeah. Right. -Right? TAYLOR: Ideally, I wanted to put a Tesla coil receiver on the boat in-in place of the battery. But all we could find was this little remote-controlled boat that the Tesla coil would have sunk in a heartbeat. So we set the receiver on the bank and ran a wire from the Tesla coil to the boat battery input. We're gonna deliver power completely by transmitting power from one Tesla coil to the other. And what kind of amperage did... does the motor pull when it's running at top speed? -Whatever it says this thing will do? -Substantial current. About 30 amps. Wow. Okay, so it's gonna require a lot of juice. -It is. -We need to make sure this isn't putting out too much power, right? -That's right. -'Cause we only have one boat, -and I don't want to fry it. -HAYS: (laughs) Yeah. -It would blow this thing up. -So let's get a voltmeter, and let's connect it up to the receiving coil, and, uh, let's go ahead and start firing things up. -Good idea. -Yeah, let's do that. NARRATOR: For this experiment, the Tesla coils will be set up a distance of 30 feet apart. The transmitting coil will send energy through the air to the top of the receiver coil and then through the ground back to the transmitting coil, creating a complete circuit. If successful, the energy being emitted from the Tesla coils and through the ground will, in turn, power the miniature boat. -Are we ready to do this? -We're ready. -Let's do it. -All right. Now's the time to just take your watch off. I'm gonna take my jewelry off. I'd recommend any of you guys do that, too. Anything that you don't want fried. This is dangerous. All right? We're gonna arm the coil. Are you good? -I'm good! -All right, you're good. -So, when, now? All right. -Yep. (buzzing, zapping) What's it say? DAVIS: 42. 43. 44. 44.4. Dude, that'll blow the boat. Just... -that'll blow it up. -It's at least twice -its red voltage. -Yeah. NARRATOR: Because the meter is indicating an electric potential of more than 44 volts, Travis is concerned that this amount of voltage won't just power the boat, it will blast it right out of the water. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, we're gonna have to figure out a way to back that off. We're either gonna have to... bring the power down here or spread the transmitter and receiver apart. NARRATOR: As Travis and Jason try to figure out how to reduce the energy being sent to the boat... their friend and colleague, Tesla biographer Marc Seifer, has arranged to meet with Tesla's oldest living relative: his grand-nephew, William Terbo. Marc is looking to find out if Tesla had, as he claimed, perfected a particle beam energy weapon that was capable of shooting down as many as 10,000 enemy planes from a distance of 250 miles away. You know, there's a question about his particle beam weapon, whether or not he built that. I know that he built prototypes, and I believe strongly that he did indeed build a particle beam weapon, and I would like to know whatever happened to it. NARRATOR: The two men have arranged to meet at one of Nikola Tesla's favorite New York destinations: the famed Player's Club, located in lower Manhattan. I wanted to tell you about this document signed by Franklin Roosevelt. It's from the White House. January 2, which is clearly before Tesla passed away. "Please call Nicholas Murray, "president of Columbia University, and ask him to give you the lowdown on Nikola Tesla." Why do you think Franklin Roosevelt would be interested in Tesla at this moment in time? Tesla h-had... many, many inventions, that in a wartime situation, any possibility was worth looking into. So-so, thinking about that, uh, we know that generals looked into Tesla's particle beam weapon. Do you think that it's a reasonable assumption that someone along the lines-- some of these military higher-ups-- wanted to get, uh, Tesla a meeting in the White House? Of course I think that the military people recognize weapons -when they see them. -The particle beam weapon. I think that there might very well be some government intervention there. When the memorabilia went to former Yugoslavia, quite often political people acquired details from it and then just neglected to bring it back. NARRATOR: If Franklin Roosevelt believed that Nikola Tesla's so-called death ray had been perfected as Tesla himself claimed, then why wasn't there any evidence of it at the Tesla Museum in Serbia? Did someone steal it from Tesla's hotel room after he died? Or could it have been stolen before? And if so, where is it now? (thunder crashing) Oh, my gosh. You really have confirmed some of the things I've been thinking about. Thank you so much. Very good. (electricity crackling) -What's the numbers? -40. 42. 43. 44. 44.4. Dude, that'll blow the boat. Just... that'll blow it up. NARRATOR: Back in Colorado, Travis Taylor and Jason Stapleton are still trying to keep the voltage generated by the Tesla coils from blowing the model boat out of the water. If Travis can prove that Tesla's experiment works, he will go a long way toward validating Tesla's revolutionary findings on the wireless transmission of electrical energy. We're either gonna have to bring the power down here or spread the transmitter and receiver apart. -Yeah, something's got to give. -Uh... what's the easiest thing to do with the way your coil is configured? Well, I think just moving them apart is easiest. All right, well, let's do that. Let's separate them. -I got to pull these off. -Yeah. Hold tight. TAYLOR: Come on back. A little further. NARRATOR: The team decides to separate the coils by another 15 feet, which they believe will cut the electrical output by half. -And... stop. -I think we're good. I think we're... This is good right here. All right, so, go ahead and set the boat here in the middle. All right, here we go. I'm just gonna kind of slide it out there, Kyle, -Yes, and then I'll push. -and then you give it a little push. You ready? Give me a little slack. Here we go. That was a good launch, I think. Look at that. -Who's going to drive? -I'll drive. You're good at driving. We'll let you drive. All right, are you guys ready over there? We're ready, man. Power... power's on. All right, Justin. Arm the coil when ready. Arming. (electricity buzzing) Armed. -It's ready to go. -All right, -it's coming up, guys. Stay safe. -Coil is going live. It's on you. All right, Jason. Come on, baby. (buzzing) I got nothing, man. Come on. -There it goes! There it goes! -Hey! (laughs) Yeah! Look at that. (all cheering) -(whoops) -Yeah, buddy! TAYLOR: When we fired up the Tesla coil and the remote control boat took off and we knew we were getting wireless transmission of power, I was exhilarated. It was amazing to see that. Tesla was on to something there. Had he done this at a full scale, he might have actually powered ships at sea or maybe other things-- flying vehicles, who knows what-- with just wireless transmission of power. HAYS: That's wireless power. TAYLOR: That's exactly right, man. So Tesla did have an idea that was practical. Whoa, look at that rooster tail. It's running now. We're wirelessly powering that boat. That is cool. This is absolute proof of that. Boom! STAPLETON: If Tesla was actually able to transfer energy wirelessly, that would've been a massive threat. Imagine the amount of attention that would have garnered from people who wanted to use that technology. TAYLOR: That's exactly what he wanted to do. We're doing it right now. So Tesla was clearly on to something. Justin, Drew, you guys have been doing Tesla coils for a long time, doing also demos and experiments. Have you seen anything like this? No. No, we have not. This wireless transmission of power. Look at the distance we got on this, man. Yeah, there's-there's real solid power there. Volts and amps. (whoops) STAPLETON: It's still going, man! Yeah! NARRATOR: Was Nikola Tesla a ground-breaking visionary whose insights into the field of wireless energy, if implemented in his time, could have changed not only the history of the 20th century but centuries still to come? And, if so, what other incredible designs and inventions still remain hidden in the scientist's missing trunks? As far as Marc Seifer and his team are concerned, the fact that the answers remain shrouded in secrecy and misinformation only adds fuel to their determination to find the truth. A truth that could be, if uncovered, more electrifying than any invention Nikola Tesla ever devised. This season on The Tesla Files... STAPLETON: Every piece of this is just one gigantic mystery. TAYLOR: We want to get inside the original lab. What else was in those missing files? Wow. Nothing stays secret in this city for long. Holy smokes. This ties the Tesla papers to military intelligence. TAYLOR: All these rumors and wild stories. Turns out that they're true. CAPTIONING PROVIDED BY A+E NETWORKS

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Channel: HISTORY

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Keywords: THC, History, The Tesla Files, The Tesla Files s1 e1, The Tesla Files season 1 episode 1, The Tesla Files se01 e01, The Tesla Files season 1 clips, The Tesla Files full episodes, The Tesla Files 1X1, watch The Tesla Files full episodes, watch The Tesla Files, The Tesla Files new season, watch history full episodes, watch history shows, history channel, Without a Trace, Researcher Marc, Marc, astrophysicist, Travis and investigative journalist Jason, unravel the mystery, Nikola

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Length: 42min 20sec (2540 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 04 2020