Jasper County Democrat, Volume 2, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 April 1899 — BOILING AWAY A DIME. [ARTICLE]

BOILING AWAY A DIME.

Silver Piece Disappeared in Taper ip Smallest Pot aad Hottest Fire, Prof. M. I. Pupin, of Columbia College, boiled a 10-cent piece the other day, and watched it dissolve and pass away in the form of vapor, just as one might do with a pot of water. 'While he was doing it he declared that any substance on earth mltht be boiled and made to become vapor if only you had heat great enough to do it He did not except granite rock. First he boiled his dime. He cut it up into small pieces, which he placed in the hollow carbon of an electric arc lamp. When the lamp is lighted the carbons stand one above the other, the sharp point of one carbon fitting into the "cup” of the other. It was in this little cup that Prof. Pupin boiled his dime. Probably it was the smallest pot and the hottest fire in the world. He placed the pieces of the dime In the hollow end of one carbon, and fixed the other pointed carbon down against them. Then he turned on the electric current. He had arranged his apparatus in front of a magic lantern, so that the whole thing could be seen on a large white screen. Of course, the electric current passing between the carbons made them ■ very hot, and the cup soon became filled with a white heat. It was wonderful to see how quickly the silver dime melted and simmered and finally boiled. It really danced around in the little pot like any liquid, getting smaller and smaller as it turned to vapor and passed away into the atmosphere. In about two minutes the last of it was seen to float away in vapor and disappear. The 10-cent piece had, in fact, boiled away.—Boston Globe.