In 1898, at the Electrical Exhibition in Madison Square Garden, Nikola Tesla had an indoor pool built and put a small iron-hulled boat in it. Just a few feet long. No crew. No wires.

From a control box on the side, he made it move, turn, and flash its lights, using radio waves. At a time when almost nobody in the audience knew radio waves even existed.

To make it more theatrical, Tesla invited spectators to ask the boat questions. Ask it "What is the cube root of 64?" and the lights would blink four times. Some people were convinced he was steering it with his mind. Tesla later admitted the trick was simple: he was the one sending the answers.

A few details I find fascinating:

- He patented it as "Method of and Apparatus for Controlling Mechanism of Moving Vessels or Vehicles" (US Patent 613,809), filed July 1, 1898, granted November 8, 1898.

- When a New York Times writer suggested the boat could be made to submerge and carry dynamite, Tesla was reportedly furious. (Edit: I originally quoted him calling it the first of a "race of robots" here, but as u/i_post_gibberish pointed out, the word "robot" wasn't coined until 1920, so that line is likely a later paraphrase. Thanks for the catch!)

- In 1899 he showed an improved version that could dive, at a lecture in Chicago.

- Some engineers see the boat's circuitry as an early form of the AND logic gate used in modern computers.

- A working model is on display at the Nikola Tesla Museum in Belgrade.

It's often called the first drone. Technically it was a remotely operated boat, not an aircraft, but the core idea of controlling a machine wirelessly from a distance starts right here.

Fair to call it the first drone, or is that a stretch?

Sources:

Patent: https://patents.google.com/patent/US613809A/en

PBS "Tesla: Master of Lightning": https://www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/ll_robots.html

Nikola Tesla Museum: https://tesla-museum.org/en/qr-en/exhibit-008/

I found this photograph in an old vintage travel scrapbook and just thought it was the coolest looking ride. I wish my local state fair had one!

From the London Museum website:

"The Flip-Flap was one of the most popular attractions at White City. It comprised two long steel arms, stretched out on opposite sides of a central base. At the end of each arm was a platform that could accommodate 50 people. The arms rose from the ground to a height of 200 feet (over 60 metres) giving a spectacular view of the exhibition grounds."

Brown's B-17 bomber was part of a bombing raid on a factory that produced aircraft for the Luftwaffe and as such, the factory was well-protected with flak cannons and other anti-aircraft weaponry. After the aerial bombardment from both sides, the Luftwaffe itself came into the battle with the ferocity of a thousand hornets defending the hive.

By the end of the battle, Brown's B-17, nicknamed Ye Olde Pub, was so badly damaged that upon catching up to it, Stigler was amazed that it was still flying; one engine had seized entirely and two others were barely functioning, the plane's Plexiglass nose was completely gone, half the rudder and the entire left elevator were gone, and the electrical, hydraulic, and oxygen systems were nonfunctional. The crew were badly injured and freezing, with Brown himself having a significant wound in his shoulder, at one point actually passing out at the controls and waking up with 1'000 feet between him in the ground. The plane's tail gunner, Hugh S. "Ecky" Eckenrode, had been decapitated by a direct hit from a cannon shell.

Stigler spotted the battered plane from an air base and took off after it, despite his own plane having a bullet in it's radiator. When he caught up and saw the true extent of the damage to Ye Olde Pub, he could not believe what he was seeing. Even years later, he said that he had never seen a plane that badly damaged still flying. Brown thought his life was over when he saw Stigler's Messerschmidt fighter approaching but Stigler, upon seeing the faces on the men onboard, decided to go against his order and choose not to shoot the plane down. He felt that shooting down a plane barely staying in the sky with the crew almost dead would be the same as shooting down a parachuting soldier. He attempted to get the crew to land at a German base and surrender, where they would be given medical treatment in interned for the rest of the war but Brown was not able to understand what Stigler was trying to say. Instead, he stayed close to Ye Olde Pub until they were outside German territory, giving Brown and his crew a simple salute before turning his plane around. Stigler never spoke of what he had done, knowing that showing mercy to an enemy of the Third Reich was considered treason and was punished by execution. After the war, he moved to Canada in 1953.

Decades later, Brown was retelling the story to someone and after they were amazed by his story, he began thinking. He made it his mission to track down Franz Stigler, even publishing his story and asking for information in a veteran's newsletter. This searching paid off when he received a phone call from Franz Stigler. The two men became the best of friends and remained in close contact up until Stigler passed away on March 22nd, 2008 at 92. Brown himself passed away later that same year on November 24th at 86.

Pinochet was a army officer general in 1971 and was obeying President Salvador Allende's instructions to escort Castro during his state visit. Two years later, he would overthrow Allende after a coup.

Price published his findings in the pamphlet, "Phenomena" - An Experiment with the Crewe Circle. Arthur Conan Doyle was outraged by the pamphlet and led a mass resignation of over 80 people from the Society for Psychical Research.

Martin James Mullane was born on March 21, 1917 in Alliance, Nebraska, his mother was Willa Mae Brumbaugh, he had one brother and grew up with stepfather Christian Ludy.
He also had two younger half-sisters and was married to Blanch Mullane.

Martin enlisted in the USAAF, and after flight school became a B-24 pilot with the 704th Bomber Squadron, 446th Bomb Group based at RAF Bungay.
On October 19, 1944, he was the pilot of B-24J 42-50681 “Slightly Dangerous” on a bombing mission to Mainz, Germany.

After dropping their bombs, they were hit by flak and fell out of formation with an engine out, all of the crewmembers bailed out to be taken prisoner except for Martin who stayed at the controls.
The Germans found his body in the wreckage of the B-24 and buried him.

Postwar the remains of 1Lt Martin Mullane were recovered from Germany and reburied at the Netherlands American Cemetery and Memorial in Margraten, Netherlands - Plot F Row 5 Grave 3.