Baron Münchhausen’s Scientific Adventures by Hugo Gernsback

Book Details

In these thirteen tales, Baron Münchhausen is shown to have not actually died in 1797 as was assumed. He along with his companion Professor Flitternix went on to become the first men to explore the moon and even the planet Mars.

These stories were first published in The Electrical Experimenter between 1915 and 1917. In 1928 the stories were edited, expanded and republished in Amazing Stories. This book reproduces the 1928 versions of the stories. Gernsback was the publisher for both The Electrical Experimenter and Amazing Stories.

Baron Münchhausen’s Scientific Adventures (1928)

1. I Make a Wireless Acquaintance
2. How Münchhausen and the Allies Took Berlin
3. Münchhausen on the Moon
4. The Earth as Viewed from the Moon
5. Münchhausen Departs for the Planet Mars.
6. Münchhausen Lands on Mars.
7. Münchhausen is Taught “Martian”
8. Thought Transmission On Mars
9. The Cities of Mars
10. The Planets at Close Range
11. Martian Amusements
12. How the Martian Canals Are Built
13. Martian Atmosphere Plant

Images from The Electrical Experimenter (1915-17)

Hugo Gernsback (1884–1967) was born in Luxembourg and came to the United States in 1904. He is considered to be one of the three Fathers of Science Fiction along with H.G. Wells and Jules Verne. In 1913, he founded the magazine, The Electrical Experimenter, which became Science and Invention in 1920. In 1926, Gernsback founded the first magazine dedicated exclusively to Science Fiction – Amazing Stories. The Hugo Awards were named after Gernsback and are widely considered the premier award in Science Fiction.

Baron Münchhausen’s Scientific Adventures has 31 illustrations including 12 illustrations from the version published in The Electrical Experimenter in 1915-17.

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Excerpt: Baron Münchhausen’s Scientific Adventures

1. I Make a Wireless Acquaintance

MY name is Ignaz Montmorency Alier. If that doesn’t suit you, call me I. M. Alier, for short. I am a Yankee by birth. Both my father and mother came over on the Mayflower and settled in Yankton, Mass., where they are engaged at present in cactus and ostrich farming. Ever since I was a little boy my father, for reasons best known to himself, taught me to be a worshiper of truth, no matter how painful it might prove. I am glad to say that my father’s teachings fell on fertile territory. I have never, consciously, uttered an untruth. The pursuit of truth, since I have grown up has become a mania with me; so much so, in fact, that even a simple exaggeration, made by my best of friends, will drive me frantic.

The average layman will best understand my somewhat peculiar state of mind, as far as truth is concerned, if I say that truth to me is nothing less and nothing more than a hobby—a sort of sport, if you wish. I collect truthful statements as one might collect stamps. Particularly beautiful and original examples of truth are written down by me on large white cards. These cards are all indexed and classified and kept, vertically filed in card files. The originator (may I say inventor?) of these truths is given full credit on these cards, so that it is easy to find years later who made this or that particular truthful statement. You will not think me immodest if I state, in passing, that nine-tenths of the cards bear my own name as author of original and surprising truths. Of course, since truth is a science with me, I realize that such a statement cannot cause much surprise:

I would not take up your valuable time with statements like the above were it not so vitally important to fully acquaint you with my character. For this reason I also find it necessary to give you the following references; any of the individuals and institutions mentioned below will be very glad to vouch for my integrity, honesty, and veracity.* I could give an almost infinite list, but I prefer mentioning only the following:

Hiram O’Rourke, lawyer, Yankton, Mass.
(The above defended me in three breach of promise suits, as well as eight perjury charges of which I was accused.)

Patrick Flanagan, jailkeeper, Yankton, Mass.

Jeremiah Addlecock, jailkeeper, Coffeeville, Me.

Mike Whiffeltree, jailkeeper, Lyreville, Vt.
(The latter knew me intimately for only five months.)

The Ananias Club, Yankton, Mass.

Now that I have thoroughly established my standing I will proceed, and I sincerely hope and trust that no one will question any statements I may be called to make in these pages. They are the bare, unvarnished truth in each and every case. If called upon, I will cheerfully swear to the truth of any of my statements, before a notary. (I am a notary myself.)

As every resident of my home town knows, I own the largest radio plant in the State. I own the only long distance radio telephone station in the country. As is known, I hold the long distance radio telephone record of the world. Even in 1900, when my set was not nearly as perfected as it is to-day, I could talk around the world and converse freely with myself, the message traveling clear around the globe. This fact was described at length in “The London Scientific Gazette of 1900.” (See Vol. XX, No. 19, page 39.) It attracted much attention at the time, but it was declared commercially impractical, for the reason that, it was argued, it was not necessary to build a giant wireless station at a tremendous expense in order to talk clear around the globe, to listen to one’s own voice; one could talk to one’s self without the expensive radio? My critics contended that it would certainly be far less expensive and perhaps more satisfactory.

This argument, quite logical as it was, for the time being discouraged me not a little, but I soon took up my studies anew and made many important new discoveries.

As president and founder of the now defunct American Wireless Mouse Trap Co. I learned a lot about rats and mice and this knowledge even today is of high importance to me.

The above company, as will be remembered by many, operated at one time, no less than 80,169,509 wireless mouse traps all over the country. If we had not been so eminently successful in killing every mouse and rat in the country, the company would, no doubt, still have been in business. As it is, the American public calls me its greatest living benefactor for ridding the country of these pests, and this alone is honor enough. For the benefit of my young readers who never saw one of my wireless mouse traps, let me give a brief description.

Each trap was constructed like a squirrel cage. The opening to the cage was fashioned in such a manner that a mouse or rat could get into it, but once in, could not of its own accord get out. Now, as anyone knows mice and rats are exceedingly fond of revolving cages. They will travel for miles to get into one. It has a most powerful fascination for them. They simply adore it and go wild about it. I am almost tempted to say that they go crazy about it, for they find it extremely hard to stop once they start running. I based my invention upon this great natural law.

The shaft of the cage was connected to a little dynamo, which was operated at high speed as soon as the mouse or rat started the cage revolving. The dynamo, in turn, was connected to a little wireless set and this in turn was connected to an aerial wire system on the roof of the house. The wireless set was constructed in such a manner that when operated, it would send out a call similar to a Western Union call box. In each locality we had a wireless “central” with operators. As soon as one of the operators received a call, he would look up his call book and see where the call originated. This took only a few seconds. A man would then be dispatched immediately to the house in question, where he would brain the mouse or rat single handed, on the spot, by means of a club. He would next reset the trap and return to headquarters, giving a full itemized report of the case. To the inexperienced, my system of killing the rodents might appear rather long-winded and expensive, but this is just where my insight into human nature came to the fore and made me famous.

Not everybody likes to kill rats and mice. This is particularly true of the feminine humans inhabitating this globe. Why this should be so I do not profess to know, although I have some vague opinions on the subject, which, however, I would rather keep to myself. What, therefore, was more natural than to employ professional ratters and mousers, to perform the disagreeable tasks? In any event, the company was a huge success and many a fair damsel even to-day, sends me highly perfumed letters hailing me as the annihilator of the arch-enemies of the fairer sex.

But I digress from my story. As I said before, I own the largest radio telephone station in the country. It is exceedingly well appointed and contains instruments and apparatus of which the greatest living scientists have as yet not the faintest knowledge.

This story starts on a bitter cold December night. I could go to some length and write two or three columns at ten cents a word, stating how the wind sang weirdly through my aerial wires on the roof; how the flames of my log fire cast fantastic shadows about the room; how my cat was softly purring on a chair near by, dreaming of some long departed appetizing canary; how the windows rattled uncannily in the storm; how the trees moaned plaintively outside, and so forth. Thus I could set the scene and prepare you for the story—getting you under tension, as the editor calls it technically.

As a plain matter of fact, however, the aerial wires were full of sleet and therefore could not “sing.” Furthermore I was glad that they didn’t come down, for that would have caused hardly pleasant music. Then the log fire, too, could not very well have cast fantastic shadows, or any other shadows for that matter, because the log fire happened to be a radiator. Instead of casting fantastic shadows, however, it cast about a lot of rank noise and every now and then made me jump clean out of my chair. Nor could the cat have purred very readily on the chair because to begin with it wasn’t a cat at all, but a dog; and he could not have purred even if he had taken lessons at $5 an hour. There were good reasons for this, too. Firstly, it was not a he; it was a she. Secondly, she had been dead for two years and only because she was stuffed so nicely did I keep her. Thirdly, she could positively not have sat on a chair near by, simply because there was only one chair in the place and I was on it. Fourthly, dogs, especially dead dogs, are not known to dream about appetizing canary birds. Then, too, no windows could have rattled in the storm, for my radio station is in the cellar and that cellar has no windows whatsoever. As for the trees moaning plaintively, or otherwise, I explained above that my people were engaged in cactus farming. There are no trees on such a farm, and cactus positively does not moan in a storm. It squeaks.

“NOW that you understand the situation fully, I will proceed. It was after 12 o’clock midnight on a cold winter night. My new, loud-talking telephone receivers were on my head and I had just lit a fresh pipe. I had been flirting with my vario-selective coupling-balance which was adjusted to a very long wavelength—96,000 meters, if my memory serves me right—and I was just in the act of tuning down to the wave length of FL.—that’s the Paris Eiffel Tower Station. Suddenly, a very faint, but exceedingly high pitched screaming sound, came through my receivers, becoming louder and louder each second. While I was still wondering what this unearthly sound could be, I heard, in a faint but clear voice:

“Alier, Yankton, Mass.—80,000 meters.” This sentence was repeated several times. I lost no time in starting my 200 Kilowatt generator, tuned up to 80,000 meters, and yelled into the transmitter in front of me.

“Ship ahoy! This is Alier of Yankton, who’s there?” Almost instantly it came:

“It is I, Hieronymus Karl Friedrich, Baron Münchhausen . . .”

Excerpt From: Hugo Gernsback. “Baron Münchhausen’s Scientific Adventures”