Tesla's Time Travelers (4 page)

“Yes, Mr. Greene.”

“So you know we have our share of sinkholes?”

“Of course.”

“Well, this portable classroom rests atop a sinkhole. A dormant one. Actually, this whole area was a Native American midden, so long before all the psychics came to Cassadaga to conjure up spirits there were ghosts already here. One night I was working late in the portable and it was dark and I heard voices, Minerva. So I went out to investigate, and among the trees were ghosts—not your Casper the Friendly variety, but dead historians. Will and Ariel Durant. Henry Adams. Bruce Catton. Mary and Charles Beard. Shelby Foote. Frederick Jackson Turner. The Frontier Thesis, Minerva?”

“Yes, Mr. Greene. His response to the 1890 census. The closing of the frontier.”

“Yes, Minerva. I’m glad you know it. But the dead historians spoke to me about this place, and that the classroom sat atop a sinkhole, but the sinkhole itself led to the ‘timeline,’ and they told me about Nikola Tesla’s time machine, which was sitting unused in the basement of the Cassadaga Hotel, and an upcoming rummage sale, and one could navigate the timeline with Tesla’s time machine…”

“The ‘timeline?’” Minerva interrupted. “Time machine?”

Mr. Greene smiled. “You know I’m a fanatic about timelines, Minerva. I hand those out the first day of class. And it was amazing to discover that my classroom sat directly on top of
the
timeline, the
real timeline
!”

Minerva looked to her classmates to see if this was all some practical joke. Was this a historical “punking?” She looked around for a hidden camera in the classroom.

“Is this a ‘punk?’” she asked. “You know, like…‘you’ve been history punked?’”

“No, Messinger,” Bette Kromer replied. “This is real. We activate the sinkhole with Tesla’s device and go back in time. We did it last spring. TV has The History Channel. We channel history,” Bette gushed enthusiastically. “I like to call us Gang Greene!” She laughed at her own play on words. No one else laughed.

Minerva Messinger didn’t know what to think. Were her classmates wacko? Was Mr. Greene wacko?

“It’s real, Minerva,” Bette Kromer said.

Bette’s use of Minerva’s given name and not her surname “Messinger” surprised her as much as anything that had already occurred. Confusion registered on her face.

“It will all be clear to you soon, Minerva,” Greene said. He walked over to the middle of the classroom to a laptop computer and projected a 1776 map of Philadelphia onto the old roll-up movie screen that Victor Bridges had pulled down after a nod from Mr. Greene. “Today,” Mr. Greene began formally, “we will visit Philadelphia on July 2, 1776. That’s the day that John Adams, in a letter to his wife Abigail, said would be the birthday of the new nation, as that was the day the resolution for independence was passed. Each of you has brought your IPod. I hope you have programmed the historic walking tour of Philadelphia CDs that Victor downloaded for you. And let’s synchronize on Standard Time, as Dr. Franklin’s concept of Daylight Saving Time hasn’t caught on yet. In fact, it won’t even be used until World War I.”

Oh no, Minerva thought. In her zeal to have the perfect colonial costume, she had overlooked the CD download. She was not about to admit that. She hoped she wasn’t blushing too much.

“It is important that you have the classic Andrew Dury map of colonial Philadelphia if we become separated,” Mr. Greene continued. “However, keep your IPods in your pockets and out of sight unless, as I said, we become separated. Okay, who can tell me the estimated population of Philadelphia according to David Mc McCullough in 1776?”

Bette’s hand went up.

“Yes, Bette?”

“Thirty thousand people,” she replied.

Minerva Messinger rolled her eyes. Bette was right, of course. She was always right. Minerva added a frown.

“Yes, thirty thousand is correct, Bette.”

Bette beamed.

“Okay, students, please take a seat and buckle up. Remember, it can be a bumpy ride.”

“It sure was a good thing the Washington Monument wasn’t completed in 1865,” Victor said. “Or our portable might have been stuck at the point.”

Minerva was perplexed.

Mr. Greene explained. “I’m afraid we brushed the side of the Washington Monument when we landed last spring, Minerva. It was my fault, really—the twilight threw my landing off a bit.” He used his podium as a steering wheel, he explained to Minerva.

“I think it was Shelby Foote’s fault, Mr. Greene,” Bette said. “He was our tour guide.”

Minerva was confused. Shelby Foote? She knew the name—a dead Civil War historian. Well, they were on the outskirts of Cassadaga, the “psychic capital of the world,” and Minerva’s mother, a true believer in the paranormal, went for a monthly reading at the Cassadaga Hotel to “channel” Minerva’s dead grandmother, but Minerva had never heard of dead historians being conjured up. This was right out of fruitcakeville, she thought. Mother would love it.

“Now,” Mr. Greene said. “I take full responsibility.” As the students watched, Greene placed a thumb drive into a USB port on his computer and typed in coordinates for the present day National Historic Park at 39 degrees, 56 minutes and 12 seconds North Latitude and 75 degrees, 8 degrees, 2 seconds West Longitude. “I’m calculating for the open space across the street from what we now call Independence Hall,” Greene said, as the students knew that before the Declaration the building was known as the Pennsylvania State House. “I don’t want to drop the trailer on the Liberty Bell. According to Thomas Jefferson’s weather journal, the temperature in Philadelphia will be 78 degrees Fahrenheit. It rained the previous night, and we may have intermittent showers today as well…”

Has Mr. Greene lost his marbles? Minerva wondered.

“That’s all great, Mr. Greene,” Victor said. “What are you using as our talisman for this trip?”

Greene smiled. “Yes, remember everyone, we used the theater poster from
Our American Cousin
to effect the transport last spring. Well…Charles and Mary, are you here?”

The ghosts of deceased early American historians Charles and Mary Beard appeared in a transparent glow in the classroom. Charles handed Mr. Greene a riding crop. Mr. Greene handed Victor his cane for Victor to hold.

Minerva’s eyes widened in fright. What was going on?

“Students, say hello to Mary Ritter Beard and Charles Austin Beard. We will be reading their work later on in the semester,” Mr. Greene said. The Beards, who resembled extras from the movie
The Great Gatsby
in their 1920s fashions, smiled but did not speak. Charles Beard did, however, float over to Mr. Greene and appear to whisper something in the teacher’s ear.

“Hello,” the students said politely.

Mr. Greene continued with his introduction of the Beards. “Mr. Beard’s seminal work was, of course,
An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution
published
in 1913. Mrs. Beard collaborated with her husband on their 1927 book
The Rise of the American Civilization.
”

Charles Beard bowed politely, revealing the part in the center of his hair, and Mary managed a curtsey in her “flapper” dress without floating out of place. Mr. Greene directed his students’ eyes to the riding crop that he swirled in a mesmerizing swoosh like a fencer twirling his epee.

“This is Caesar Rodney’s riding crop,” Greene explained. “Mr. Rodney was a delegate from Delaware who suffered from a debilitating facial cancer, but made the ride from Delaware to Philadelphia to cast a deciding vote for independence. The Delaware delegation was split with one vote for independence and one against it. British Admiral Howe had already landed his seven hundred ships at Staten Island in New York and troops were planning to march the one hundred miles to Philadelphia to hang the rebels. Only if our Founding Fathers could establish that the colonies were an independent nation could the delegates to the Continental Congress shelter themselves in the rules of war. Benjamin Franklin, the wisest man in America, knew that the king of France, hungry for revenge for the loss of his American lands in the French and Indian War, wasn’t going to help the colonies unless they broke with England. Rodney, who was ill, hadn’t expected Delaware delegate George Read to vote against independence. So he wound up riding eighty miles overnight in the rain and mud of the lousy colonial roads from Dover to Philadelphia. Heck, he even survived his cancer, living until 1784. He was a tough old bird, and his riding crop is going to help us get to Philadelphia.” Greene pointed the riding crop to the overhead projection of the colonial Philadelphia map, a bit north of Chestnut Street between 5
th
and 6
th
streets on the Dury map. He went to his students and handed them each a 1999 quarter-dollar. “This is Delaware’s commemorative quarter. Victor, what is on the back of the coin?”

“A rider in a tri-corner hat on a horse.”

“Yes,” Mr. Greene said. “What else?”

“Delaware 1787, the first state and good old E Pluribus Unum.”

“Yes, ‘out of many one’ in Latin, anything else?”

“Caesar Rodney?”

“Yes, Caesar Rodney. Delaware revered Caesar’s ride even more than Massachusetts revered Paul’s, ha ha.” No one laughed at the pun on “Revere” and Greene went on with a hint of disappointment on his face. “So Rodney’s ride to cast Delaware’s vote for independence was put on its commemorative coin. Ever since 1999, Rodney’s riding crop has had magical powers for some reason. I like to think it has historical powers gained on the ride for independence. Or perhaps it is the power of a United States commemorative coin.”

“Wow!” said Victor Bridges. He had never thought that a commemorative coin might have some magical power.

Mr. Greene is wacko, Minerva thought.

“Buckle up, students,” he warned before touching the riding crop to the map. He held onto a lectern that was bolted to the floor.

The classroom began to shake. Mary and Charles Beard floated merrily about the classroom, dashing in and out of the students, whose desks remained shakily bolted to the floor of the trailer. The ghosts stared a moment at Minerva Messinger, then nodded to each other. They floated up to either side of Minerva’s face and planted ghostly kisses on both of Minerva’s cheeks.

“Helppppp!” Minerva yelled.

Bette Kromer was rattling back and forth in her desk. “Buck up, Messinger,” she called. “It’s not the kiss of death because they’re already dead!”

The other students laughed. Minerva quickly recovered, and the laughter ceased. The Beards began to whirl about and spin counterclockwise, like ghostly spinning tops, until their images disappeared, only to reappear a moment later dressed in colonial period costumes, Mrs. Beard’s transparent image sporting a hairdo that resembled a beehive atop her head. So that was what it was supposed to look like, Minerva Messinger realized as she evaluated the ghost. Mom, she said to herself, you should be here. This isn’t just nuts, this is cashews! This is right up
your
alley.

The shaking in the portable classroom slowed and then stopped. Minerva scanned the bulletin board. Where was the Dunlap broadside of the Declaration of Independence? It had disappeared.

As if he were reading Minerva’s mind, Greene spoke up as the trailer came to a halt. “Look, students,” he said, pointing to the bulletin board. “The broadside is gone. What happened to it?”

Bette Kromer’s hand went up.

“Yes, Bette?

“It hasn’t happened yet. It’s not the 4
th
; it is the 2
nd
.”

“Yes!” Greene replied. He moved to the classroom door and cracked it open, holding up Caesar Rodney’s riding crop. As a breeze from 1776 entered the classroom, Minerva Messinger watched in disbelief as the riding crop disappeared.

“Mr. Greene, the riding crop!” Victor Bridges shouted.

“Yes,” Mr. Greene said evenly. “I believe Mr. Rodney is using it at present, as he is riding to Philadelphia from Delaware at this very moment. We shall need to retrieve the crop later today to return. He may throw the riding crop into the air like a bride tossing her bouquet, so we will have to catch it. Open the shades please, Victor,” he added as he went to the computer and typed in some commands.

Victor nodded to the Anderson twins to help him and each boy rolled up a window shade.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Greene said with a theatrical bow and a swirl of his tri-corner hat. “I give you Philadelphia on the morning of July 2, 1776.”

Actually, they had landed in a summer wheat field on the outskirts of the town, a half-mile from his intended landing spot, but the appreciative History Channelers applauded Mr. Greene. Even Minerva Messinger joined in clapping, although she was still too startled to appreciate the reality that lay just beyond the walls of the portable classroom and the summer wheat field in which the portable classroom had landed: the city of Philadelphia in 1776.

Chapter 3

“Okay people, let’s go over the ground rules quickly,” Mr. Greene said, waving his cane for emphasis. “The portable will only be here for five minutes. Back at school a holographic image of the portable is in place, but it can only be sustained for five minutes. I have programmed the classroom to return to this spot at precisely 5 P.M. So, even if we get separated, we need to meet here at five minutes to five. Find the location on your Dury map on your iPod and mark it. Also, watch for second floor chamber pots—but most likely they tossed their pots out last night. Still, look up from time to time. And before we go out into the Philadelphia air, let’s all remember the butterfly effect,” Mr. Greene said, turning his gaze to Victor Bridges.

Victor hated “the stare,” the way Mr. Greene seemed to see through you with just a stare, like he could read a student’s mind. Victor tried valiantly not to think unclean thoughts when he was in Mr. Greene’s presence for fear Mr. Greene would learn his fantasies of Minerva Messinger, whom Victor secretly envisioned as a Victoria’s Secret lingerie model. Victor felt himself shrinking under the glare of Greene’s gaze. And what was worse, Mr. Greene was waiting for Victor to respond.