Tesla and P.T. Barnum

[alice wellintown]

Reading Tesla I can't quite make out his tone; he seems serious
enough, but his stories and his outragious claims read more like
Barnum's letters to the newspapers-letters he wrote to draw huge
crowds to his exhibitions. Both men talk of automation and dabble in
it. Barnum, after he exploits Joice Heth, an African American women in
her 80s; Barnum claims she is twice this age and that she is the nurse
of George Washington. When he is found out he first writes a letter to
the press claiming that she is not a women at all but an automaton.
Later he charges a fee to her autopsy. He also puts a Black boy in
black face, a fake fake, and these are only the start of his
outragious schemes. Tesla read no better; his mad plans are described
with much the same languaghe of Barnum, though Tesla seems quite
serious.