The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow's World

by Charles C. Mann

But the last and greatest descendant of Mouchot and Ericsson was an uncompromising Portuguese priest, Manuel António Gomes, known as Father Himalaya for his extreme height. Born into a poor family in 1868, Father Himalaya went into the priesthood mainly for the paycheck. A polymath who taught himself chemistry, biology, and optics, he invented an explosive, himalayite, said to be safer and more powerful than dynamite, and the first rotary steam engine. He was critical of other solar pioneers, because their mirrors did not track the sun with sufficient precision: their inexact alignments meant that the central boiler cast a shadow on the mirror. By contrast, Father Himalaya’s first solar engine, which avoided both problems, generated temperatures hot enough to melt iron. Indeed, its very effectiveness was a problem. His second prototype, incorrectly operated by an assistant, melted itself down before a delighted mob. Undaunted, Father Himalaya decided to build a new machine that would track the sun automatically, without needing unreliable human operators. The Pyrheliophoro was unveiled at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. Shaped like a sail, its reflector consisted of 6,117 hand-sized mirrors attached to a steel frame forty-two feet high. The Pyrheliophoro focused light so intensely that an awed New York Times reporter noted that the reflected heat killed birds forty feet above it. It could produce temperatures up to 7000°F, then the highest ever seen on Earth.