Word: currently
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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...early Edison companies, a sphere of historic significance in any year celebrative of Electric Light. He resigned from his Edison connection because it was necessary for him to make a fundamental decision about this new electrical industry which was growing up. The decision lay between Direct and Indirect Current...
...Edison had surveyed Niagara Falls on his own initiative in 1886. His first assistance to the new-formed Cataract Construction Co. consisted simply in repeating that electric power could be transmitted from the Falls, as Direct Current...
...this opinion he was joined by the late great George Westinghouse. Both counselled against attempting to make and transmit Alternating Current, despite its comparative cheapness. Mr. Westinghouse had an alternative idea-Compressed Air, upon which he had been experimenting (e.g. his air-brake). The original plans of Cataract Construction Co. actually called for a plant at the Falls whence Mr. Westinghouse felt confident he could transmit compressed air to take the place of steam behind industrial pistons in Buffalo, 20 mi. away...
...face of these expert opinions, Scientist-Financier Adams remained a dissenter. He had read in foreign scientific publications about the success some Swiss engineers were having with Alternating Current, which requires, as schoolboys know, much less initial impulse and much less bulky lines for transmission over long distances, than is required for Direct Current. Proponents of Direct were saying that high voltages of Alternating would "jump right off the wire"; that it was dangerous, fit only for use in lethal chairs at penitentiaries. Mr. Adams quietly ordered some experiments in insulation, which eventuated in the familiar porcelain cup device...
Then, actuated as much by scientific curiosity as by financial prudence, he set off for Europe to see for himself the status of Alternating Current. Before going he ended all his Edison connections, to remain unprejudiced in the controversy...