The sun melted the solder

Charles Abbot of the Smithsonian set up a public demonstration of his solar engine. The sun was the point of the machine, and the sun was stronger than the joints. It melted the solder. The press headline was blunt: the sun refuses to be harnessed. Harris & Ewing made the photograph of the attempt, not of a triumph. That is the picture. A serious instrument, a crowd that came to see power pulled out of daylight, and a star that declined to cooperate. The story on the back is the headline they actually printed.