A Man of Science and Engineering in Troubled Times Wandering in the Late Qing Dynasty

Drinking in the United States is naturally drinking whiskey.

The degree was not low, and Li Yu and Situ Meitang got drunk very quickly.

Now the Hongmen in New York has not yet become a big climate, and the Anliang Main Hall has not yet been established, so there are no complicated procedures.

Otherwise, all kinds of rituals with the boss of the Hongmen can take a long time.

After a few glasses of wine, they are brothers.

However, Situ Meitang didn't deliberately ask Li Yu if he wanted to join the Hongmen, perhaps because he felt that since he was already a brother, it made no difference whether he joined the Hongmen or not.

The next day, Situ Meitang prepared a small box and planned to meet Franklin Roosevelt together.

The Roosevelt family is of Dutch descent, and is now one of the richest and oldest families in New York State (the history of the United States is only a few hundred years old, which is considered long).

Li Yu pointed to the small box in Situ Meitang's hand and asked, "What's inside?"

After opening it, Situ Meitang said, "A few stamps from the Qing Post Office."

"Stamps?" Li Yu asked.

Situ Meitang said: "Roosevelt is a philatelist, although I can't figure out why this thing is interesting to collect."

Roosevelt was also one of the earliest philatelists, and he even liked to design stamps.

These stamps of the Qing Dynasty held by Situ Meitang are also quite valuable in later generations.

Not many stamps from the Qing Dynasty have been handed down, and a good one costs tens of thousands of yuan.If it is the legendary "small red printed characters worth one yuan", only 32 pieces have been handed down, and the value is tens of millions.

These stamps in Situ Meitang's hands were all mailed from China to pick them up, and they still had stamps on them.

Fortunately, Roosevelt Jr. still liked it.He has collected more than 120 million stamps in total. For him, the stamps of the Qing Dynasty are also rare.

Little Roosevelt received a very typical American elite education.

The middle school is the prestigious Groton School, which specializes in cultivating politicians.Entered Harvard University as an undergraduate, and graduated from Columbia University Law School as a graduate student.

He was very busy during his studies, either with heavy reading tasks or various sports or community activities.

Basically not much free time.

But Roosevelt Jr. is actually good at many ball games,
It is a pity that he suddenly suffered from polio (poliomyelitis) after middle age, and spent most of his later years in a wheelchair.Roosevelt Jr. is definitely the most famous sufferer of the disease.

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Columbia University is located in Upper Manhattan. The campus architecture is quite classical, not far from Fifth Avenue.

After all, Li Yu owns a car.

"My friend Roosevelt!"

As soon as they entered the campus, they happened to bump into Franklin Roosevelt wearing a golf cap.

"Mr. Situ Meitang, do you have any legal questions?" Roosevelt Jr. asked.

"It's not me who has the problem," Situ Meitang said, "it's Li Yu next to me."

"Li Yu?" Roosevelt Jr. said, "That great scientist in the East? Why is he so young?"

Li Yu smiled and said, "I'm always a few years older than you."

It's weird to say that, but at least it's true for now.

Roosevelt Jr. said: "It turns out that in just a few years, you can do so many things and become a top-notch scientist."

"We are going in different directions. If it is an official career, it is impossible to rise too fast..."

Li Yu suddenly remembered that Zai Zhen was still young as Shangshu, and Puyi's father Zaifeng became regent at the age of 25, so he had to add another sentence, "It is for your country."

Situ Meitang took out the stamps of the Qing Dynasty: "It happened that a few letters were sent from China during this period, and I specially left the stamps for you."

Little Roosevelt's eyes lit up: "Mr. Situ is too polite!" But his mind was very flexible, and he said instead, "I'm afraid it's not a small matter that you need to entrust to me today, right?"

Situ Meitang laughed and said, "It's not a small fee to hire a lawyer, but I don't think you're short of money, so I just took a few stamps. In our Chinese words, it's called doing what you like."

Roosevelt Jr. said: "Then I can only say that you have succeeded! Tell me, what is it?"

Li Yu told Roosevelt Jr. that he needed to go public and that he needed legal assistance.

Little Roosevelt thought about it: "Contract drafting is not difficult, and I can ensure your absolute control over the company. But as far as I know, it is not easy to list on the New York Stock Exchange. You need to buy qualifications from old members." But now that the stock is so hot, I am afraid that the old members will not want to delist, because a lot of money can be raised in the stock market.”

Li Yu said, "Mr. Morgan assisted in this matter."

"Mr. Morgan?" Roosevelt Jr. was surprised, and immediately felt relieved, "If he can speak, it will be easy. He has a lot of membership seats in his hand."

Situ Meitang asked: "So, you have accepted the order?"

"It's over," said Roosevelt Jr., "just as a semester assignment. There are not many opportunities for such a good assignment. If I successfully complete it, I will definitely be able to get the first place in this semester's assessment."

Li Yu said: "In the future, there must be a lot of things that need to trouble you. You can be the first in every semester."

Roosevelt Jr. smiled and said, "If it's really possible to go public, I'd love to be your legal adviser."

Nowadays, there are not many companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange, and they are basically industrial giants.

Moreover, the New York Stock Exchange has gotten rid of the previous corruption, scams, and frauds, and has become the strongest exchange in the United States.

In fact, for quite a long time after the establishment of the New York Stock Exchange, the stock exchanges in Maryland and Philadelphia in the United States were almost the same as the New York Stock Exchange in terms of transaction scale and activity.

But unlike other exchanges, the NYSE prohibits Ponzi-style financing, which has helped the NYSE gradually win the competition against other exchanges.

Coupled with the invention of the telegraph, the influence of the New York Stock Exchange on other regional stock exchanges was once again greatly strengthened.The rapid marginalization of other exchanges allowed Wall Street to become the center of U.S. stock and securities trading.

Otherwise, it is likely that New York's financial status will be dispersed to a certain extent to Washington or Philadelphia.

Within a few days, Roosevelt Jr. came up with very detailed contract terms, clearing away the most critical issue of ownership and control for Li Yu in listing.

The current listing process is much less than that of later generations, and there is no super complicated financial audit.

Of course Wall Street doesn't have that bull either.

The specific process of going public did not need to be handled by Li Yu at all, and Morgan entrusted his assistant Spencer to handle it quickly.

After all, they also hope to make a good profit from Li Yu's company.

Many financiers on Wall Street have made a lot of profits in stocks such as steel companies, railway companies, and steamship companies.

Li Yu knew in his heart that they only wanted to engage in stock trading, but he could also enable the company to obtain financing quickly and continue to develop. A win-win situation is good for everyone.

—and if you don't give Wall Street predators some sweetness, they probably won't make themselves feel better in the future.

When Roosevelt Jr. and Morgan's people were carrying out specific listing operations, Li Yu was not idle, and he continued to make some improvements to the radio equipment.

After obtaining a large amount of financing in the future, it is absolutely necessary to have good products with advanced technology and excellent quality to spread the market, and competition will come unexpectedly.

Li Yu will come up with products of different grades and prices to meet different needs.

He continued to enhance the anti-jamming ability of radio equipment through the triode, and improved the coverage of radio.

These two items can be said to be the most desired by radio customers at present.

To give a painful example, the Titanic incident nine years later.

At that time, the ship was actually equipped with Marconi radio equipment, and the operator on the ship had received an iceberg warning, but the operator was busy sending and receiving personal telegrams and did not see it.

After the collision, a distress call from the Titanic reached the nearest steamship, the Californian.

Coincidentally, the radio operator of the Californian just finished his shift 10 minutes before the accident, and did not see it!
These are still man-made disasters.

But it has to be said that Marconi's radio equipment technology on the Titanic is not good enough to blame.

Because the day before the accident, the wireless telegraph failed, resulting in a mountain of "important" passenger personal telegrams, which kept the operator busy.

Everyone needs to know the situation at that time. In the era when radio was just born, the radio on board was largely a carrier of vanity, which could satisfy those passengers who wanted to brag about their experiences by sending sea telegrams to friends: In the eyes of the upper class, A telegram sent from sea is quite "fashionable".

In addition to the technical problems of Marconi's radio equipment and the operator's inability to prioritize communications, the ship's radio equipment has poor anti-jamming capabilities and channels are prone to jamming.This prevented the Titanic from receiving clear iceberg warnings from other ships as it made its deadly journey.

In short, there are many factors in the occurrence of the Titanic accident. Human factors cannot be avoided, but technical factors can always make up for it.

——It’s just that the human factor cannot be changed, and perhaps it still cannot make this accident invisible.

But in the subsequent rescue work, the radio still played a role.Otherwise, given the weather conditions at the time, if there were no distress signals continuously sent out by radio equipment, all passengers would have been doomed.

Li Yu is a prophet of the future. He is fully aware of the development direction of radio, and he can occupy the market on a large scale without even engaging in contract fraud and attempting to monopolize small tricks like Marconi.

As usual, Li Yu applied for these two patents for anti-jamming and improving coverage.Of course, they will lead to a significant increase in product prices, and they can only be used for large customers such as ocean-going ships.

After the pre-listing on the New York Stock Exchange, Li Yu received the purchase request immediately.

Here comes the U.S. Navy.

The current U.S. Navy is not huge, but it is an isolated country overseas, and it attaches great importance to the navy.

"Excuse me, is this Mr. Li Yu from LY Company?"

Li Yu looked at the man in the navy uniform and asked, "It's me. Are you?"

"I'm from Naval Operations, and you can call me Major Abel. I was told by the administration that your company has a very advanced piece of radio technology that we are interested in purchasing."

"You guys are really quick. I just got a new patent." Li Yu said.

"Great, we need the latest technology," Major Abel said, "The Navy needs to purchase 20 sets of radio equipment with a budget of $40."

Li Yu never imagined that there would be a big contract right from the start.

In the future, the demand in the civilian field will be much greater than that in the military field. If you can build a reputation in the government system like the navy, there will be a steady stream of orders in the civilian field.

Li Yu asked: "According to the routine, should we bid?"

Colonel Abel said, "Really, because we also invited the Marconi Company to bid."

At this moment, Marconi's influence is even stronger, because Tesla was too flat before, and did not make much radio equipment, so its popularity failed to spread.

Instead, Marconi continued to expand with his keen business acumen.There is also a reason why he was able to win the Nobel Prize afterwards.

Li Yu took the tender from Major Abel. The navy's requirements were not complicated to him, and they happened to be the anti-jamming and coverage requirements of his patent application.

But after looking at the bidding document, I found that the Navy's requirements are really strict. The bidding document states that it wants to achieve intercontinental communication capabilities, or more than 3000 kilometers.

Fortunately, the given budget is sufficient, and it should be possible to do it with the help of the amplification effect of the triode.

Li Yu found Tesla with the bidding letter, put it in front of him, and asked, "Mr. Tesla, have you sobered up?"

Tesla rubbed his eyes: "Do you have good wine?"

"If you want to drink, after we get the contract and beat your big rival Marconi, I will drink with you until dawn."

Historically, the loss of the radio patent had a great impact on Tesla, otherwise he would not have been so poor in his later years.

Tesla glanced at the tender: "$40?!"

Li Yu said: "It's just an appetizer. Are you interested in doing something big? We can snatch the wireless market all over the world, and we can annex Marconi's company."

"Annex Marconi?" Tesla's eyes finally lit up, "Sounds very interesting to me."

Li Yu took out the listing contract and an employment contract: "In addition, my LY company has been successfully listed and will receive a large amount of funds. I formally invite you to become the technical director. Are you interested?"

"IPO? Technical director?"

Tesla was a little blindfolded again.

He previously worked for two companies, the original Edison Electric Light Company, and later Westinghouse Electric.

At neither company was he an executive, just a technician.

Moreover, many companies in the United States do not pay much attention to technical personnel. They are not very different from ordinary workers, but they are paid more.

Technologists rarely get into management unless they are founders themselves.

And Tesla himself briefly opened a company, but he was obviously not good at doing business, the company was very unsuccessful, and it ended up in the hands of others inexplicably.

"What is the title of a technical director?" Tesla asked.

Li Yu said: "Executives, and executives who can enter the board of directors."

Tesla has completely ignited his blood. He can become an executive of the board of directors of a listed company. He knows that he will make a lot of money without thinking about it. He may continue to conduct wireless power transmission experiments in the future.

"I agree!" Tesla said.

Li Yu smiled slightly. He knew that Tesla had no way out, and with such high conditions, there was absolutely no reason to refuse.

Li Yu then took out a design book: "Recently, I am developing a new radio technology, but I have encountered some bottlenecks in signal demodulation, and I just need your help."

Tesla rubbed his eyes, looked carefully for a while, woke up from the wine instantly, and shouted: "This, how is this possible!? The radio can transmit sound?"