Nikola Tesla: The Biography
Nikola Tesla is referred to by some as the patron saint of modern technology. The sobriquet is a fitting one as Nikola was a deeply-religious man whose life was defined by ritualistic habits, personal sacrifice and a desire to improve the lives of all humanity. The inventor of the polyphase alternating current electrical system and the discoverer of the rotating magnetic field, Nikola Tesla’s contribution to the advancement of electrical engineering is unsurpassed.
Born in a small village in Croatia in 1856, Nikola was educated in Austria and Prague before entering the telephony industry in the 1880s. Clearly an exceptional young man with a brilliant mind and a work ethic few could compete with, Nikola’s future looked bright. Yet, on Nikola’s arrival in America, no one could have predicated just how much the Serbian son of a priest would achieve. While still a young man Nikola developed a polyphase system of electrical distribution using alternating current. Nikola took on the Wizard of Menlo Park himself, Thomas Edison, in the war of the currents and emerged as victor.
Victory for Nikola was often short-lived as he struggled to generate the necessary funds to develop his extraordinary inventions. Dealing with powerful financiers who demanded huge returns from investment in his revolutionary inventions, Nikola rarely came out on top. The eccentric inventor also found himself going head to head with rival inventors who ignored Nikola’s patents and used his work without credit throughout his life. Nikola’s naivety or perhaps disinterest when it came to business matters led corporations and individuals to take advantage of him and he died penniless as others made millions from his work.
A spectacular showman, Nikola became famous due in part to his exciting demonstrations during which he would frequently pass huge amounts of electricity through his body and create lightning bolts that shot across the room. Much of Nikola’s life was lived in luxurious settings. Immaculately groomed, worldly and refined, Nikola was a central member of the New York social elite and dined in the finest restaurants, lived in the most prestigious hotels and rubbed shoulders with the famous and wealthy.
Yet, Nikola would never achieve his ultimate goal. A goal so gargantuan in premise that even now it boggles the mind - to create a wireless system that could transmit not only words and images but power across the globe. Nikola’s Wardenclyffe Tower enterprise would be his undoing and he never quite recovered from his failure to realize his epic dream.
Nikola Tesla is remembered now by some as the archetypal ‘mad scientist’, partly due to his interest in interplanetary communication and a claim that he had made contact with Mars. But those who know a little more about Nikola’s life can see him for what he truly was; a unique person with a thoroughly exceptional mind, Nikola Tesla is nothing less than the patron saint of modern electricity.
Nikola Tesla: The Biography
Nikola Tesla is referred to by some as the patron saint of modern technology. The sobriquet is a fitting one as Nikola was a deeply-religious man whose life was defined by ritualistic habits, personal sacrifice and a desire to improve the lives of all humanity. The inventor of the polyphase alternating current electrical system and the discoverer of the rotating magnetic field, Nikola Tesla’s contribution to the advancement of electrical engineering is unsurpassed.
Born in a small village in Croatia in 1856, Nikola was educated in Austria and Prague before entering the telephony industry in the 1880s. Clearly an exceptional young man with a brilliant mind and a work ethic few could compete with, Nikola’s future looked bright. Yet, on Nikola’s arrival in America, no one could have predicated just how much the Serbian son of a priest would achieve. While still a young man Nikola developed a polyphase system of electrical distribution using alternating current. Nikola took on the Wizard of Menlo Park himself, Thomas Edison, in the war of the currents and emerged as victor.
Victory for Nikola was often short-lived as he struggled to generate the necessary funds to develop his extraordinary inventions. Dealing with powerful financiers who demanded huge returns from investment in his revolutionary inventions, Nikola rarely came out on top. The eccentric inventor also found himself going head to head with rival inventors who ignored Nikola’s patents and used his work without credit throughout his life. Nikola’s naivety or perhaps disinterest when it came to business matters led corporations and individuals to take advantage of him and he died penniless as others made millions from his work.
A spectacular showman, Nikola became famous due in part to his exciting demonstrations during which he would frequently pass huge amounts of electricity through his body and create lightning bolts that shot across the room. Much of Nikola’s life was lived in luxurious settings. Immaculately groomed, worldly and refined, Nikola was a central member of the New York social elite and dined in the finest restaurants, lived in the most prestigious hotels and rubbed shoulders with the famous and wealthy.
Yet, Nikola would never achieve his ultimate goal. A goal so gargantuan in premise that even now it boggles the mind - to create a wireless system that could transmit not only words and images but power across the globe. Nikola’s Wardenclyffe Tower enterprise would be his undoing and he never quite recovered from his failure to realize his epic dream.
Nikola Tesla is remembered now by some as the archetypal ‘mad scientist’, partly due to his interest in interplanetary communication and a claim that he had made contact with Mars. But those who know a little more about Nikola’s life can see him for what he truly was; a unique person with a thoroughly exceptional mind, Nikola Tesla is nothing less than the patron saint of modern electricity.
Nikola Tesla: The Biography
