Weekend Stubble

... is the honorary Harry Stephen Keeler character of the Year.

And the prize goes to: Death-Ray Matthews.

HE WORKED on a killer beam aimed at knocking out aircraft engines and killing all on board. The eccentric inventor also claimed the deadly ray could shrivel plants, electrocute mice and ignite lamps up to four miles away. Now a new book about Welshman Harry Grindell Matthews has been published, and could be turned into a film.

The scientist established a lab surrounded by barbed wire and searchlights in the lower Swansea Valley during the early 1930s. People travelled for miles to peek at the bungalow where the inventor said he was working on the beam, which used high intensity radio waves. Dubbed “Death Ray Matthews”, he also worked on the development of sound in film and a string of other innovations, including a device to cast images onto clouds...