NIKOLA TESLA
Engineer,
Inventor (c.1856-1943)
Inventor
Nikola Tesla contributed to the development of the alternating-current
electrical system that’s widely used today and discovered the rotating magnetic
field (the basis of most AC machinery).
SYNOPSIS
Inventor
Nikola Tesla was born in July of 1856, in what is now Croatia. He came to the
United States in 1884 and briefly worked with Thomas Edison before the two
parted ways. He sold several patent rights, including those to his
alternating-current machinery, to George Westinghouse. His 1891 invention, the
“Tesla coil,” is still used in radio technology today. Tesla died in New York
City on January 7, 1943.
EARLY LIFE
Nikola Tesla
was born on July 10, 1856, in what is now Smiljan, Croatia. He was one of five
children which included siblings Dane, Angelina, Milka, and Marica, in the
family. Tesla’s interest in electrical invention was spurred by his mother,
Djuka Mandic, who invented small household appliances in her spare time while
her son was growing up. Tesla’s father, Milutin Tesla, was a Serbian orthodox
priest and a writer, and he pushed for his son to join the priesthood. But
Nikola’s inerests lay squarely in the sciences. After studying at the
Realschule, Karlstadt (later renamed the Johann-Rudolph-Glauber Realschule
Karlstadt); the Polytechnic Institute in Graz, Austria; and the University of
Prague during the 1870’s, Tesla moved to Budapest, where for a time he worked
at the Central Telephone Exchange. It was while in Budapest that the idea for
the induction motor first came to Tesla, but after several years of trying to
gain interest in his invention, at age 28 Tesla decided to leave Europe for
Americal.
FAMED INVENTOR
In 1884
Tesla arrived in the United States with no more than the clothes on his back
and a letter of introduction to famed inventor and business mogul Thomas
Edison, whose DC-based electrical works were fast becoming the standard in the
country. Edison hired Tesla, and the two men were soon working tirelessly
alongside each other, making improvements to Edison’s inventions. However,
several months later, the two parted ways due to a conflicting
business-scientific relationship, attributed by historians to their incredibly
different personalities: While Edison was a power figure who focused on
marketing and financial success, Tesla was commercially out-of-tune and
somewhat vulnerable.
After
parting ways with Edison, in 1885 Tesla received funding for the Tesla Electric
Light Company and was tasked by his investors to develop improved arc lighting.
After successfully doing so, however, Tesla was forced out of the venture and
for a time had to work as a manual laborer in order to survive. His luck
changed in 1887, when he was able to find interest in his AC electrical system
and funding for his new Tesla Electric Company. Setting straight to work, by
the end of the year. Tesla had successfully filed several patents for AC-based
inventions.
Tesla’s AC
system eventually caught the attention of American engineer and business man
George Westinghouse, who was seeking a solution to supplying the nation with
long-distance power. Convinced that Tesla’s inventions would help him achieve
this, in 1888 he purchased his patents for $60,000 in cash and stock in the
Westinghouse Corporation. As interest in an alternating-current system grew,
Tesla and Westinghouse were put in direct competition with Thomas Edison, who
was intent on selling his direct-current system to the nation. A negative-press
campaign was soon waged by Edison, in an attempt to undermine interest in AC
power. Tesla, for his part, continued in his work and would patent several more
inventions during this period, including the “Tesla coil,” which laid the
foundation for wireless technologies and is still used in radio technology
today.
Unfortunately
for Thomas Edison, the Westinghouse Corporation was chosen to supply the
lighting at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, and Tesla
conducted demonstrations of his AC system there. Two years later, in 1895,
Tesla designed what was among the first hydroelectric power plants in the
United States, at Niagara Falls. The following year, it was used to power the
city of Buffalo, New York, a feat that was highly publicized throughout the
world. With its repeat successes and favorable press, the alternating-current
system would quickly become the preeminent power system of the 20th
century, and it has remained the worldwide standard ever since.
In addition
to his AC system and coil, throughout his career, Tesla discovered, designed
and developed ideas for a number of other important inventions-most of which
were officially patented by other inventors-including dynamos (electrical
generators similar to batteries) and the induction motor. He was also a pioneer
in the discovery of radar technology, X-ray technology, remote control and the
rotating magnetic field-the basis of most AC machinery.
THE FALL FROM GRACE
Having
become obsessed with the wireless transmission of energy, around 1900 Nikola
set to work on his boldest project yet: to build a global, wireless
communication system-to be transmitted through a large electrical tower-for
sharing information and providing free electricity throughout the world. With
funding from a group of investors that included financial giant J.P. Morgan, in
1901 Tesla began work on the project in earnest, designing the building a lab
with a power plant and a massive transmission tower on a site on Long Island,
New York, that became known as Wardenclyffe. However, when doubts arose among
his investors about the plausibility of Tesla’s system and his rival, Guglielmo
Marconi-with the financial support of Andrew Carnegie and Thomas
Edison-continued to make great advances with his own radio technologies, Tesla
had no choice but to abandon the project. The Wardenclyffe staff was laid off
in 1906 and by 1915 the site had fallen into foreclosure. Two years later Tesla
declared bankruptcy and the tower was dismantled and sold for scrap to help pay
the debts he had accrued.
DEATH AND LEGACY
After
suffering a nervous breakdown, Tesla eventually returned to work, primarily as
a consultant. But as time went on, his ideas became progressively more
outlandish and impractical. He also grew increasingly eccentric, devoting much
of his time to the care of wild pigeons in New York City’s parks. He even drew
the attention of the FBI with his talk of building a powerful “death beam,”
which had received some interest from the Soviet Union during World War II.
Poor and
reclusive, Nikola Tesla died on January 7, 1943, at the age of 86 in New York
City, where he had lived for nearly 60 years. But the legacy of the work he
left behind him lives on to this day.
WARDENCLYFFE PROJECT
Since
Tesla’s original forfeiture of his Wardenclyffe site, ownership of the property
has passed through numerous hands, and several attempts have been made to
preserve it, but in 1967, 1976 and 1994 efforts to have it declared a national
historic site failed. Then, in 2008, a group called the Tesla Science Center
was formed with the intention of purchasing the property and turning it into a
museum dedicated to the inventor’s work.
In February
2009 the Wardenclyffe site went on the market for nearly $1.6 million, and for
the next several years, the Tesla Science Center worked diligently to raise
funds for its purchase. In 2012, public interest in the project peaked when
Matthew Inman of TheOatmeal.com collaborated with the TSC in a Internet
fundraising effort, ultimately receiving enough contributions to acquire the
site in May 2013. Work on it restoration is still in progress.