Emil
L. SCHARF
Negative Gravity
http://zapatopi.net/blog/?post=201506179681.prof_e_l_scharfs_negative_gravity
2015-06-17
Prof.
E. L. Scharf's Negative Gravity
by
Lyle Zapato
[ Related : FARROW : Antigravity ]
http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84026749/1904-04-03/ed-1/seq-41/
Washington Times ( Washington DC ) 3 April 1904
When
Buildings and Battleships Fly
Marvelous
Possibilities in the Negation of Gravitation

The discovery of
perpetual motion, the transmutation of metals and the
annihilation of gravitation are mysteries which have baffled the
minds of men ever since, and probably long before, the dawn of
civilization.
Until the beginning of the twentieth century whenever these
fascinating subjects wore broached, the scientist could only
answer, and rightly, too, "Impossible," for he had neither
theoretical data nor experimental evidence to indicate that such
things could be.
With the advent of radium, however, a long step was was taken
looking toward the ultimate realization of these
little-understood phenomena, for by its wonderful manifestations
of radiant energy it has given us an insight into the actuality
of what we term perpetual motion, projecting as it does its
corpuscles carrying electric charges and capable of doing work
without losing any of its original weight and without cessation;
likewise it offers an analogous condition to that of
transforming the baser metals into those of precious worth,
since it is now known with certainty that radium changes into
helium.
These are not mere glittering generalities, but cold, hard
facts, obtained by rigid experiment by such observers as
Becquerel, the Curies and Lord Ramsey.
But gravitation! Is this attractive force which draws bodies
upon or near the surface of the earth to forever remain without
the pale of man's analysis? Radium offers no solution for the
mysterious attraction, although Newton did solve its laws.
When asked what gravitation is it is easy to say that it is the
force which causes every particle of matter in the universe to
attract every other particle. But just what this force may be is
another and more serious question and as difficult to answer as
"What is electricity?"
In either case the laws governing their actions are quite well
known, and since all kinds of energy, such as light, heat and
mechanical motion, may be changed from one to another, it has
been assumed that gravitation is merely another phase of
electric or magnetic action, and according to the extraordinary
experiments of Professor Scharf of Washington D. C., it would
seem to verify the theory that there is a very close linking
between these different forces.
Professor Scharf's postulates seem to be based upon sound
deductive and experimental reasoning in that he begins with the
simplest fundamental tests in electricity, namely, electric
attraction and repulsion. If two pieces of paper or other bodies
are equally charged with the same kind of electricity, say of
the positive sign, they will instantly repel each other,
regardless of gravitational force.
This can be easily tried by heating a couple of strips of
newspaper, to expel the moisture, and then in a dry room rub
them briskly with the finger tips, when they will fly apart. But
this is not all that occurs; for wherever a charge of positive
electricity is generated there will be in the immediate
neighborhood an equal charge of negative electricity.
In Professor Scharf's description of his experiments in
electrically elevating the body against the contending force of
gravity he does not say how or by what means this negative
charge is absorbed or conducted away whilst the earth and its
complementary subject are positively charged; but with a
fundamental principle of such gigantic import as the one he is
wrestling with it is but natural that he should desire more time
to verify his deductions.
That the earth is charged with electricity there can be no
doubt, though it is not always charged to the positive sign.
This is the reason that telegraphers must search sometimes for
what is called a good ground; but there are places where the
earth is constantly positive and in such a place would the
anti-gravitation test best succeed. Again such a condition might
be produced artificially.
The writer has often noted, when working with X-ray coils of
high potential, say of eighty or one hundred thousand volts,
that if he accidentally touched on of the terminals a peculiar
lifting sensation quite like that described by Professor Scharf
always resulted.
This may or may not have been due to the repelling force exerted
between his own body and the earth being charged with positive
electricity; but it is a significant fact, nevertheless.
According to the laws of electrostatics, which state that
electric charges of like signs repel each other and electric
charges of opposite signs attract each other, it is reasonable
to believe that if the earth and the subject were both
negatively electrified the same result of repulsion would be
manifested.
Under these conditions it may not be very far from the mark if
we assume that Professor Scharf has devised ways and means for
charging the human body to a degree of electrification equally
with that of the earth. That it requires a certain potential,
that is pressure, of positive electricity, there can be no
doubt; but there is no difficulty in producing a potential of
any voltage up to a million.
One of the simplest methods for obtaining those high potentials
is by means of a frictional machine such as physicians use in
giving electric treatment. It comprises one or more glass disks
two or three feet in diameter set on an axis and arranged so
that they may be revolved. On one side of the glass disk a
cushion made of silk or leather presses firmly against its
surface; this generates the electricity, and on the opposite
side are some metallic points attached to a ball of metal called
the prime conductor, which gathers in the positive electricity.
If a subject is is now placed on a glass plate to insulate him
from the earth he may be charged with electricity to his fullest
capacity and then if the earth is similarly electrified, or if,
as Professor Scharf asserts, gravitation is a phase of
electricity, the subject must be repelled from its surface. Any
object, theoretically, even if it were a battleship or a
skyscraper, must be repelled from its surface. Any object,
theoretically, even if it were a battleship or a skyscraper,
must be repelled if it and an equal mass of the earth were
similarly charged.
One cannot say absolutely that gravitation is of an electrical
nature; but yet we know how easy it is to convert electricity
into magnetic lines of force by merely causing a current to flow
through a coil of wire, and conversely it is just as easy to
transform magnetism into an electric current by passing wire
through a magnetic field; we know that the earth acts like a
huge magnet, and as it revolves in space around its own axis at
the rate of more than a thousand miles an hour it is reasonable
that high potential charges of electricity are set up in and on
its surface and that this is what causes the apple to fall to
the ground and which we speak of as gravitation.
Whatever may be said of the working of these theoretical
considerations, it is good to speculate upon them, not only for
their scientific value, but for the worldwide good they would
bring humanity if put to commercial uses.
Negative gravity would be the greatest scientific discovery ever
made.
Washington
Professor Claims to Have Discovered Earth's Greatest
Secret
If you see the Flatiron Building rising in the air some evening
and calmly sailing off toward Westchester, like Santos-Dumont's
flying machine; or if you see Bunker Hill Monument floating like
a bird on the wing up among the clouds; or, better still, if you
happen to see the Capitol at Washington go past on its way
through the air from the Potomac to New England, you may be sure
that Professor E. L. Scharf, of 931 F street Northwest,
Washington, has put his theory of levitation into working order.
Professor Scharf, formerly of the faculty of the Catholic
University of America, now a teacher of languages, has
discovered how to break the law of gravitation. He thinks that
he will soon be able to solve the problem of the flying machine,
of lifting great weights and causing buildings weighing
thousands of tons to sail off into space like feathers by
reversing the attraction of gravitation.
The bald statement of such a discovery sounds like a chimerical
phantom, another fool's gold, the vagary of a visionary recluse.
Admitted. But a talk with Professor Scharf removes all such
impressions.
The man who thinks he has the clew to the control of a force so
wonderful that it will, if developed, revolutionize the
scientific and commercial worlds, is a big, solid man, modest,
practical, jolly, prosaic, expectant and tolerant of ridicule —
in fact, the very opposite type from that one would look for in
the projector of so startling a claim.
There is nothing of the Cagliostro or Archimedes in his style.
This is probably the reason he has succeeded, even with no more
than tentative results from his experimentation, in interesting
both statesmen and, more to the point, New York capitalists in
his scheme.
Professor Scharf is confident of the correctness of his
conclusions, and explains that his process is based on
well-known scientific facts, and is merely a logical development
of a logical theory.
HOW
I DISCOVERED NEGATIVE GRAVITY
by
PROF. E.
L. SCHARF
Formerly
of the Faculty of the Catholic University of America.
The earth being charged with positive electricity, proves that
if a man could charge himself with the same sort of electricity
he would be repelled from the earth's surface. "Like repels
like," and opposites attract each other. It is a rule that is as
old as the hills.
You will remember the elementary experiment with the two cork
balls suspended with silk cords. You rub one with resin inducing
a positive charge, the other with glass, charging it negatively.
Then you approximate the balls, and they fly together. Now you
rub with glass the ball you had rubbed with resin, and on
approximating them you find that they spring apart from each
other.
What does this prove? Both the automatic repellance of similarly
charged electrical bodies and the fact that it is possible to
change the electrical charge of a given body.
By charging my body with the same positive force that the earth
contains I have actually reduced the weight of my body seven
pounds, and only stopped the experiment there because I began to
feel a fainting sensation about the heart that made me think
perhaps there might be danger in the experiment.
I had insulated a pair of the finest scales by placing them upon
glass.
Close to the scales I placed my electrical appliance, the
construction of which I will, of course, not divulge, beyond
saying that it employs wires which run from beneath the surface
of the earth, connect with my body, and back to the earth again.
Stepping on the platform of the delicately adjusted weighing
machine, I noted with the greatest care the succeeding
registration.
I was growing lighter! One, two, three pounds was gone from my
normal weight of a moment before. Prudence or timorousness
dictated a halt, but the exhilaration of hope, the impelling
desire to put my discovery to a positive test, bade me continue.
Losing His
Weight.
The sensitive register showed a continual diminution of my
weight. Four — five — six — yes, even seven pounds lighter than
when I first took the record. Accompanying this loss of weight
were strange sensations, such as never in all my life had I
experienced.
A sense as of casting off physical moorings crept over me.
Lightness gradually pervaded my body, and as I turned on the
current I felt as if I were actually rising; yes, almost flying.
It was a peculiar feeling about my heart which decided me to
suspend the experiments, until I can test my plan on dummies and
the lower animals, to make sure there is no attendant danger,
or, if there is such danger, to obviate it.
For years the idea of such a force opposed to gravity had buzzed
in my brain. My attention was first called to it while I was
connected with the Catholic University.
The reading of the modern and classic Hindoo and Persian works
made me take notice of the claim, seemingly substantiated, that
seers of these two races were able by prostrating themselves
upon the ground, and by other mystic rites which probably had
nothing to do with the natural phenomena, to raise their bodies
into the air.
The ascending of our blessed Lord and Master, Jesus, into the
heavens with a physical body convinced me that it was done by
natural laws of which He must have been the master. The highest
proof of the Master's divinity was His ability to control laws
that to humanity were a sealed book. That he rose into the air
proves to me that He, as master of the universe, understood the
secret of negative gravity.
The fact that all the levitation claimed by the Eastern doctors
was and is preceded by prostration upon the ground reveals the
secret of the phenomena.
Electric
Phenomena.
I naturally inferred that something in the earth itself was the
power which, properly controlled, was strong enough to
successfully oppose the attraction of earth for physical
objects. As a scientist I knew that electricity was the
underlying principle of many physical manifestations, and that
the earth was charged with the positive element of electricity.
As soon as I stepped from the scales after my experiment of
charging my body with positive force and reducing my weight
seven pounds, the energy employed in the experiment departed to
the earth, and a moment after, stepping upon the scales, I found
that my weight was normal again.
I firmly believe that within fifty years the force which for
want of a better name has been called levitation will be so
thoroughly understood and its uses and control so well
demonstrated that it will occupy a position in the list of great
public utilities such as the electric telegraph, the telephone,
the wireless telegraph and the electric railway hold to-day.
Expects
Ridicule.
The storms of doubt, the shafts of ridicule, and the jeers of
the unthinking will prove as idle in combating the development
of this new force — or rather an application of that force — as
did opposition, satire and doubts in the first half of the last
century toward crushing a great discovery.
One has only to consult the official records of the proceedings
in Congress to bear out this assertion. It was before you were
born, to be sure, but within the memory of your father, that a
modest appropriation of $25,000 was asked from Congress to cover
the expense of constructing an electrical telegraph line between
Washington and Baltimore.
This line was intended to demonstrate the practicability of the
invention of Samuel F. B. Morse. What happened? Why, learned
statesmen in both houses of Congress thundered invectives
against such willful waste of the public moneys upon a chimera.
Morse was dubbed an eccentric dabbler in hopeless experiments,
and so widespread was the ignorance as to natural phenomena that
the members of the great legislative body really regarded his as
insane.
Every inventor, discoverer, or experimenter, who is in danger of
being deterred in his chosen work by abuse from those in
authority, ridicule from the cynical, doubt or apathy on the
part of the public, should refresh himself and take new heart by
reading up on the vicissitudes of Morse and his telegraph.
Fund for
Experiments.
We do things differently nowadays. Private capital and
governmental aid is not lacking in any matter concerned with the
onward march of science. This has truly been called the golden
age for inventors, developers, and even dreamers.
Hundreds of thousands of dollars are obtained with ease for the
construction of dirigible balloons, so-called flying machines,
submarine boats of various types, wireless telegraph stations at
sea and on land, new explosives, and new armament, while within
the memory of men now active in Washington life, Prof. Morse was
compelled humbly to supplicate for a paltry $25,000, that he
might give to the world one of its greatest discoveries.
My experience in obtaining the promise of financial backing for
my further experiments is a verification of this statement.
Enjoying a life-long and close friendship with the late Senator
Hanna, I had no difficulty in securing proper letters of
introduction to New York capitalists. I laid my scheme before
men who are pre-eminently devoted to the practical, and have no
time for the consideration of visionary dreams, with an abiding
fear, I confess that my proposition would be considered to come
within this category.
I was surprised and delighted at the ready response. "Why,
certainly," I was told, "we are willing to put up a few
thousands merely for experiments. We understand that you are not
yet able to promise certain results — if you were your demand
would be for millions instead of thousands, and you would be in
a position to demand them." With this assurance I returned to
Washington and resumed teaching, having postponed further
experiments until after the coming campaign, in which I expect
to take an active part.
EVERY MAN
HIS OWN AIRSHIP
With the establishment of control over the law of gravitation,
flying machines would cease to be a need of the world, for then
all that would be necessary to enable one to fly would be for a
man to charge himself with positive electricity to an extent
which would make him lighter than air, and he would rise from
the surface of the earth like a balloon.
A small gasolene or other motor operating a swift propeller, and
a rudder, and motion in any direction would be accomplished.
In order to descend, it would be necessary to carry on the
upward flight a storage battery containing a supply of the
negative current, and by turning this on himself the mid-air
traveler would negate the positive charge and slowly descend to
earth.
With such a plan, however, the storage battery would become
all-essential, and what would happen if the soarer should lose
both his battery and his propeller, thus being obliged to remain
suspended in the upper aerial strata for want of a ladder on
which to descend, is a phase of the matter which it is
unpleasant to dwell.
This idea suggests another one — that of the safe, humane and
speedy disposition of criminals under capital sentence. All that
would be necessary would be to send the condemned man aloft
without motor or storage cylinder, charging him heavily with the
"Scharf current," and he would simply fly off into space and
become a minute speck of star dust, or perhaps form the nebula
for a new planet.
Here naturally occurs an eerie suggestion—that of the
possibility of forcing this current into unwilling subjects, and
thus compelling them to take unexpected flights to Mars or
elsewhere.
Why could not any one who knew how to control this mystic field
send a charge into his dearest enemy, while the latter was
devoid of propeller or anti-charge, and thus send him spinning
off into the unknown?
Should this cherished ambition be realized there will be some
lively moving days and giant kaleidoscopic effects for the
inhabitants of this mundane sphere in the future. The Washington
monument, that massive and beloved shaft which towers above all
other obelisks in the world, may become a tourist, and go the
rounds of American cities, historic battlefields, expositions,
and patriotic celebrations, with greater ease than has the
Liberty bell been transported from its revered domicile in the
Quaker city.
More than that — it could be towed behind any sea-going tug to
our world-scattered provinces, by imbuing it with sufficient
force to make it float on the water.
Who knows but that when Aladdin rubbed his magic lamp and
summoned the genii to do his bidding, the huge black employed in
producing such marvelous results the "Scharf force."
The Washington professor holds as within the area of
probability, when his experiments shall have been completed,
that massive blocks of granite, giant pieces of mechanism,
heavily laden trains and lofty buildings will be as easily
elevated and shifted about as pawns on a chessboard!
If ponderous freight trains of a hundred cars may be lightened
with as much ease as he was on the scales, then the problem of
transportation will have been reduced to a minimum.
Moving
Extraordinary.
Another possibility which presents itself is of the moving
order, and truly as fascinating as the Arabian Nights Tales.
Swiftly growing New York, with its ever changing centers of
activity, may become the arena of genuine elevated traffic and
of real rapid transit before another century dawns.
Fancy Greater New York reaching to Poughkeepsie on the north and
to Montauk Point on the east. Imagine the rush hour on "moving
day," May 1, 1999. A vast army of workers, imbued with the
"Scharf current," and with the "negating cylinders" as closely
guarded as the present New Yorker clutches his transfer slip,
will be self-propelled "down-town" to Harlem, or across town
from the present sandy stretches of Long Island. Above the
city's hum they will meet, moving, like themselves, the Flatiron
Building, old Trinity Church, two score giant skyscrapers and a
bridge or two from the East or North Rivers, similarly possessed
of the anti-gravitation impulse, and the never-ending desire to
get "up town" to new and more suitable locations.
Revolutionizes
War.
War methods will be revolutionized, if some pacific arbitration
tribunal, like that at The Hague, shall not have put an end to
the strife between nations.
Submarine boats charged with the elevating current will steal
under immense battleships and silently charging them with the
deadly fluid, send them into space in the twinkling of an eye.
Then swift and terrible indeed will be the destruction wrought
by contending hosts in battle. Vast armies of invaders will,
when properly equipped with the elevating current and
propulsionary apparatus, rise above the obstacles of
transportation, ignore the forts and destroyers of their foe,
turn on the "juice," and move with awful swiftness toward and
over the enemy's strongholds.
Then will come a clash in midair. It will be as easy for the
gunners to train the heaviest pieces of field artillery upon the
opposing force as it now is for the street gamin to aim his
popgun. After the carnage victors and vanquished will alike
descend with the aid of the negating current and settle down to
a truce on the plains or in the valleys beneath.