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"I think a lot of kids whose mental growth outruns their maturity gravitate to science fiction."
- Dan Simmons

Disinto  
  A disintegrating ray.  

Robot AL-76 was created to take on one job - running a Disinto on the moon. The farmers of Hannaford County, Virginia were surprised to meet him.

There exists no adequate description of what occurred afterwards, in spite of the presence of seventy witnesses...

...AL-76 pulled a switch. The Disinto worked, and seventy-five trees, two barns, three cows and the top three quarters of Duckbill Mountain whiffed into rarefied atmosphere...

Technovelgy from Robot AL-76 Goes Astray, by Isaac Asimov.
Published by Ziff-Davis in 1941
Additional resources -

This story is a lot of fun to read; you can find it in The Complete Robot.

For a similar device, see the Wunderland Treatymaker from Ringworld Engineers by Larry Niven.

(Thanks to Randy for pointing this one out.)

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Additional resources:
  More Ideas and Technology from Robot AL-76 Goes Astray
  More Ideas and Technology by Isaac Asimov
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  Tech news articles related to works by Isaac Asimov

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