Jade Topp

Daniel MacDevitt

Projects 10

30 Nov. 2017

Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla was born during a lightning storm on July 10th, 1856 in Smiljan, Croatia to

Milutin Tesla and Djuka Mandic. His father was an Orthodox priest while his mother tended the

farm and invented household appliances. Tesla was one of five children in the family. Even as a

child, he showed phenomenal intelligence and excelled in his studies. To entertain himself, he

would spend his days in his fathers library. Milutin wanted his son to go into priesthood, but

Nikolas interests laid squarely in science.

As he grew older, Tesla attended the University of Prague and the Polytechnic Institute in

Austria, studying engineering. He then moved to Budapest, where he toyed with the concept of

an alternating current induction motor. In 1882, Tesla moved to Paris to work for the Continental

Edison Company, where he actually built his first induction motor after work hours. At age 28,

he moved to New York City. All he had was four cents in his pocket, mathematical calculations,

a few poems, and a drawing for a flying machine. He met with none other than Thomas Edison,

who employed the man. They had drastically different work ethics, and their lack of common

ground would inevitably lead to conflict between the two inventors.

After separating from Edison, Tesla patented a system of alternating current generators,

transformers, transmission lines, motors, and lighting. A man named George Westinghouse, the

owner of the Westinghouse Electric Company, heard about Teslas concepts. He purchased the
rights from Tesla for $60,000, plus royalties from every sale. With a new influx of cash, Tesla

bought his own laboratory.

In 1893, the Westinghouse Company was given the contract to create a powerhouse to

harness the power of Niagara Falls. The International Niagara Falls Commission had held a

competition to find proposals as to how to use the waterfalls to create electricity. Experts all

around the world had applied, but every proposition fell short. Head of the commission was Lord

Kelvin, a British physicist who avidly supported alternating current. Kelvin approached

Westinghouse and offered him the opportunity to use alternating current systems at Niagara

Falls. After five years of work, Teslas brainchild was complete. On November 16, 1896, the

switch was thrown, and the power reached Buffalo, New York.

Back at his laboratory in New York City, Tesla began experimenting with high-frequency

electricity. The result of this experimentation was the Tesla Coil, still in use to this day. It

worked by taking ordinary household currents and making them high-frequency. The coil could

also create high voltages. Patented in 1891, today it is used in televisions and radios. With this

high-frequency energy, Tesla was able to develop some of the first neon and fluorescent lighting,

along with taking the first x-ray images.

In his later years, Tesla would rid the world of his patent on alternating current, making

the technology free to use, revolutionizing the world of electricity. He experimented in Colorado

Springs for about 9 months, and even created man made lightning. In 1900, he received an

investment from J.P. Morgan. The project was ill-fated and eventually abandoned. It was Teslas

greatest shame. He suffered from a nervous breakdown after the venture was scrapped and was

never the same after. He grew more bizarre, coming up with plans for death beams and spending

most of his time feeding wild pigeons around New York. Nikola Tesla eventually died on
January 7th, 1943, in a room of the Hotel New Yorker, where he had lived for the last ten years.

He was 86.

Nikola Teslas accomplishments and advancements in the world of energy cannot be

denied. A genius from childhood, he revolutionized the application of electricity not only in

America, but the entire globe. His willingness to destroy his own patent allowed for great

improvement in technology, the shockwaves of which can still be felt today.

Works Cited

Hunt, Inez Whitaker. Nikola Tesla. Encyclopdia Britannica, Encyclopdia Britannica,

Inc., 9 June 2017, www.britannica.com/biography/Nikola-Tesla.

Jacobson, Rebecca. 8 Things You Didnt Know About Nikola Tesla. PBS, Public

Broadcasting Service, 10 July 2013, www.pbs.org/newshour/science/5-things-you-

didnt-know-about-nikola-tesla.

Nikola Tesla. Biography.com, A&E Networks Television,

www.biography.com/people/nikola-tesla-9504443.

Tesla: Life and Legacy. PBS, Public Broadcasting Service,

www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/index.html.

Vujovic, Ljubo. Nikola Tesla - The Genius Who Lit the World. Tesla's Biography, Tesla

Memorial Society, 10 July 1998, www.teslasociety.com/biography.htm.