John Andrews

Portuguese-born inventor who demonstrated a water-to-gasoline additive to the U.S. Navy in 1916–1917, converting plain water into a combustible fuel using drops of a mysterious green liquid. Disappeared after the Navy demonstration. Conflicting accounts claim he either returned to Canada, was found alive in Pennsylvania in 1942, or was murdered in his home with his lab ransacked.

Field	Details
Full Name	John Andrews
Born	Unknown (reportedly Portuguese-born)
Died	Disputed — possibly 1937 (murdered) or later (natural causes)
Age at Death	Unknown
Location of Death	Disputed — possibly his home (if murdered); possibly Pennsylvania (if died later)
Cause of Death	Disputed — one account says murdered at home; another says he lived into the 1940s
Official Ruling	Unknown
Category	Energy Inventor

Assessment: UNCERTAIN

John Andrews is one of the earliest documented cases of an inventor who demonstrated a fuel technology to the U.S. military and then vanished. In 1916 or 1917, Andrews demonstrated his water-to-fuel additive at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, converting a bucket of water into a combustible liquid using drops of a green fluid. Navy officers witnessed the demonstration, and the Navy offered to place $2,000,000 in escrow for the formula. Andrews never accepted, and he disappeared. The story becomes contradictory from this point: one widely cited account claims Andrews was found murdered in his ransacked home, with all notes and green powder missing, and that his sister fled to Scotland with copies of his notes only to be murdered herself a year later. A competing account — supported by newspaper evidence — states that reporter James Kilgallen found Andrews alive on a farm near Library, Pennsylvania in 1942, where Andrews claimed he had "forgotten the formula." The U.S. Naval Institute published articles about Andrews in both 1936 and 1979, treating him as a genuine historical figure whose invention was never explained. A 2019 Skeptic magazine article by Dan Plazak investigated the case and concluded it was "the invention of a legend" — a myth that grew over decades. The truth of what happened to John Andrews remains genuinely uncertain.

Circumstances of Death

Version 1: Murder and Ransacked Lab

According to one widely circulated account, John Andrews was found murdered in his home, reportedly in 1937. His laboratory had been ransacked, and all of his notes and his supply of the green powder additive were missing. According to this version, Andrews' sister obtained copies of his notes and fled to Scotland. She was allegedly murdered there approximately one year later. This version of events implies a coordinated effort to eliminate both Andrews and anyone who possessed his formula.

Version 2: Found Alive in 1942

According to an account attributed to reporter James Kilgallen (father of journalist Dorothy Kilgallen), Andrews was found alive in 1942 living on a farm near Library, Pennsylvania — a small town south of Pittsburgh. When asked about his invention, Andrews reportedly stated that he had forgotten the formula. This account, if accurate, would contradict the murder narrative.

The Navy's Search

According to accounts published in the U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, after Andrews disappeared following his demonstration, a Navy officer named Meriwether accompanied police to Andrews' home, where they reportedly found signs of a violent struggle in a ransacked house. No trace of Andrews was found. However, some accounts reconcile this by noting that Andrews had simply reported back to his post in the Royal Canadian Navy — he was a Canadian serviceman during World War I.

Resolution Unknown

The contradictions between these accounts have never been resolved. It is possible that the "ransacked lab" and the "found alive in Pennsylvania" accounts refer to different time periods — Andrews may have first disappeared back to Canada (explaining the ransacked home), then returned to the United States years later (explaining Kilgallen finding him in 1942), and may or may not have been murdered at a later date.

Background

The Water-to-Fuel Demonstration (1916–1917)

In the fall of 1916 or early 1917, John Andrews arrived at the New York Navy Yard (Brooklyn Navy Yard) Engineering Laboratory driving a Packard automobile. He was accompanied by a man who identified himself as a banker from McKeesport, Pennsylvania, who said he had discovered Andrews conducting experiments on an old engine in his back yard.

Andrews requested permission to demonstrate that he could run an internal combustion engine using water as fuel. The Navy agreed.

The Demonstration

The Navy inspected Andrews' equipment and found his fuel can empty. They provided him with a bucket of plain water. Andrews took the water and, in a short time, passed the can back — evidently full of something. According to the Navy account published in Proceedings (March 1936):

Andrews had poured at least half a gallon of water into a feed tank, then took from his vest pocket a small vial and dropped six or seven drops of a greenish liquid into the tank. The engine ran on the resulting mixture.

The demonstration was reportedly conducted on a motor boat fitted with a dynamometer, allowing the Navy to measure the fuel's performance quantitatively. The results were reportedly comparable to gasoline.

The $2,000,000 Offer

The Bureau of Engineering was sufficiently impressed to ask Andrews to name a price for his invention. Andrews asked for $2,000,000. The Navy offered to place $2,000,000 in escrow at any reputable bank Andrews designated, to be released when he had divulged the formula and taught ten naval officers to successfully mix the fuel. Andrews reportedly declined or never followed through with the arrangement.

Naval Institute Coverage

The story was significant enough that the U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings published articles about Andrews twice:

• March 1936: "An Amazing Demonstration of Water as Fuel" (Vol. 62/3/397)
• August 1979: "Where Are You, John Andrews, Now That We Need You?" (Vol. 105/8/918)

The fact that the Navy's own professional journal treated the demonstration as genuine — decades after it occurred — suggests the Navy officers who witnessed it believed what they saw.

Skeptical Analysis

In 2019, Dan Plazak published "Making Gasoline from Water: John Andrews and the Invention of a Legend" in Skeptic magazine (Vol. 24, Issue 1). Plazak's investigation concluded that the Andrews story had grown into a legend over the decades, with details being embellished and contradictory accounts proliferating. The article treated the water-to-gasoline claim as scientifically implausible and the suppression narrative as unverified.

Why This Death Possibly Raises Questions

• Ransacked home: The Navy officer who visited Andrews' home reportedly found signs of a violent struggle and ransacking. Whether or not Andrews was killed at that time, someone was interested enough in his work to break in and take everything
• Missing notes and additive: All of Andrews' notes and his supply of the green powder/liquid were missing after the break-in. This follows the pattern of research disappearing seen with Nikola Tesla, Floyd Sweet, and Mark Tomion
• Sister allegedly murdered: If the account of Andrews' sister fleeing to Scotland with copies of the notes and being murdered there is accurate, it indicates a coordinated international effort to eliminate the formula
• Navy interest: The U.S. Navy witnessed the demonstration and offered $2,000,000 — a massive sum in 1917. Military interest in a fuel technology that could convert seawater into engine fuel would have enormous strategic implications, and would threaten both the petroleum industry and rival nations
• Pattern: Andrews demonstrated a water-based fuel technology and disappeared — the same trajectory as Stanley Meyer, who demonstrated a water fuel cell and died during an investor meeting, and Andrija Puharich, who held a patent for water splitting and whose home was destroyed by arson

The Counterargument

• Converting water into a hydrocarbon fuel using drops of a liquid additive violates fundamental chemistry — water (H2O) does not contain carbon, which is required to form gasoline
• The green liquid may have been a concentrated hydrocarbon fuel itself, making the demonstration a simple (if clever) fraud
• Dan Plazak's 2019 investigation in Skeptic magazine found the story to be largely legend
• Andrews was found alive in 1942 and claimed to have "forgotten the formula" — which is more consistent with a fraud who couldn't reproduce his trick than with a suppressed inventor
• The conflicting accounts (murdered vs. alive in Pennsylvania vs. returned to Canada) suggest the story has been heavily mythologized

See Also

• Stanley Meyer — Water fuel cell inventor who died suddenly in 1998
• Andrija Puharich — Medical inventor with US patent for water-splitting; home destroyed by arson
• Tom Ogle — Fuel vapor system inventor who was shot, drugged, and died of overdose
• Rudolf Diesel — Diesel engine inventor who vanished from a ship in 1913

Other Shocking Stories

• Ken Rasmussen: Associate threatened at gunpoint by four suited men with MAC-10s who knew his family's daily routines.
• Dallis Hardwick: Co-invented Mondaloy superalloy replacing Russian rocket engines. No obituary exists. All three key people now dead or missing.
• Peter Ferry: Retired Army Brigadier at Marconi, found electrocuted with electrical leads in his mouth.
• David Sands: Marconi satellite scientist died when his car, loaded with gasoline cans, exploded on a highway at speed.

Sources

• An Amazing Demonstration of Water as Fuel — U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, March 1936
• Where Are You, John Andrews, Now That We Need You? — U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, August 1979
• Gasoline Pill — Wikipedia
• Making Gasoline from Water: John Andrews and the Invention of a Legend — Skeptic Magazine, Vol. 24, Issue 1 (2019)
• John Andrews' Water Fuel (Sources) — Anomalies: the Strange & Unexplained
• John Andrews: Water-to-Gasoline Additive — Energy Invention Suppression Cases
• Guido Franch: Water to Gasoline — Rex Research
• 1947 Apr 2 — John Andrews, Inventor of Substitute for Gasoline Disappears — Newspapers.com

This information was built by Grok and Claude AI research.