john jacob astor

Essays
Colonizing the Cosmos: Astor’s Electrical Future

Colonizing the Cosmos: Astor’s Electrical Future

During America’s Gilded Age, the future seemed to pulse with electrical possibility. Iwan Rhys Morus follows the interplanetary safari that is John Jacob Astor’s A Journey in Other Worlds, a high-voltage scientific romance in which visions of imperialism haunt a supposedly “perfect” future. more