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//-->Nikola Tesla1Nikola TeslaNikola TeslaTesla, aged 37, 1893, photo by Napoleon SaronyBorn10 July 1856Smiljan, Austrian Empire (modern-day Croatia)7 January 1943 (aged 86)New York City, New York, USAmodern-day CroatiaBudapest, modern-day HungaryFranceManhattan, USACitizenshipAustrian Empire (10 July 1856 – 1867)Austria-Hungary (1867 – 31 October 1918)United States (30 July 1891–7 January 1943)Electrical engineeringMechanical engineeringEdison Machine WorksTesla Electric Light & ManufacturingWestinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Co.Higher Real GymnasiumGraz University of Technology (dropped out)DiedResidenceFieldsInstitutionsAlma materKnown forInfluencesInfluencedNotable awardsSignatureErnst Mach, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Mark Twain, Swami Vivekananda, VoltaireGano DunnNikola Tesla(Serbian Cyrillic: Никола Тесла; 10 July 1856–7 January 1943) was a Serbian-American[1][2]inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, physicist, and futurist best known for his contributions to thedesign of the modern alternating current (AC) electricity supply system.[3]Nikola TeslaTesla gained experience in telephony and electrical engineering before emigrating to the United States in 1884 towork for Thomas Edison. He soon struck out on his own with financial backers, setting up laboratories andcompanies to develop a range of electrical devices. His patented AC induction motor and transformer were licensedby George Westinghouse, who also hired Tesla as a consultant to help develop a power system using alternatingcurrent. Tesla is also known for his high-voltage, high-frequency power experiments in New York and ColoradoSprings which included patented devices and theoretical work used in the invention of radio communication,[]for hisX-ray experiments, and for his ill-fated attempt at intercontinental wireless transmission in his unfinishedWardenclyffe Tower project.[]Tesla's achievements and his abilities as a showman demonstrating his seemingly miraculous inventions made himworld-famous.[4]Although he made a great deal of money from his patents, he spent a lot on numerous experiments.He lived for most of his life in a series of New York hotels although the end of his patent income and eventualbankruptcy led him to live in diminished circumstances.[5]Tesla still continued to invite the press to parties he heldon his birthday to announce new inventions he was working and make (sometimes unusual) statements.[6][7]Becauseof his pronouncements and the nature of his work over the years, Tesla gained a reputation in popular culture as thearchetypal "mad scientist".[8]He died in room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel on 7 January 1943.Tesla's work fell into relative obscurity after his death, but since the 1990s, his reputation has experienced acomeback in popular culture.[9]His work and reputed inventions are also at the center of many conspiracy theoriesand have also been used to support various pseudosciences, UFO theories and New Age occultism. In 1960, in honorof Tesla, the General Conference on Weights and Measures for the International System of Units dedicated the term"tesla" to the SI unit measure for magnetic field strength.[10]2Early years (1856–1885)Nikola Tesla was born on 10 July(O.S. 28 June)1856 to Serbian parentsin the village of Smiljan, Austrian Empire (modern-day Croatia). Hisfather, Milutin Tesla, was a Serbian Orthodox priest.[]Tesla's mother,Đuka Tesla (née Mandić), whose father was also a Serbian Orthodoxpriest,[11]had a talent for making home craft tools, mechanicalappliances, and the ability to memorize Serbian epic poems. Duka hadnever received a formal education. Nikola credited his eidetic memoryand creative abilities to his mother's genetics and influence.[12][]Tesla's[13]progenitors were from western Serbia, near Montenegro.Tesla was the fourth of five children. He had an older brother namedchurch, where his father served. Both the houseDane and three sisters, Milka, Angelina and Marica. Dane was killed inand church were burnt down during the Yugoslava horse-riding accident when Nikola was five.[14][]Some accounts sayWars.[citationneeded]The Croatian Government has[]that Tesla caused the accident by frightening the horse. In 1861, Teslarebuilt both.attended the "Lower" or "Primary" School in Smiljan where he studiedGerman, arithmetic, and religion.[]In 1862, the Tesla family moved to Gospić, Austrian Empire, where Tesla's fatherworked as a pastor. Nikola completed "Lower" or "Primary" School, followed by the "Lower Real Gymnasium" or"Normal School".[15]In 1870, Tesla moved to Karlovac to attend school at Higher Real Gymnasium, where he was profoundly influencedby a math teacher Martin Sekulić.[][16]Tesla was able to perform integral calculus in his head, which prompted histeachers to believe that he was cheating.[17]He finished a four-year term in three years, graduating in 1873.[18][]Rebuilt, Tesla's rebuilt house (parish hall) inSmiljan, where he was born, and the rebuiltNikola Tesla3In 1873, Tesla returned to his birthtown, Smiljan. Shortly after he arrived, Teslacontracted cholera; he was bedridden for nine months and was near deathmultiple times. Tesla's father, in a moment of despair, promised to send him tothe best engineering school if he recovered from the illness[][](his father hadoriginally wanted him to enter the priesthood).[19]In 1874, Tesla evaded being drafted into the Austro-Hungarian Army in Smiljan[]by running away to Tomingaj, near Gračac. There, he explored the mountains inhunter's garb. Tesla claimed that this contact with nature made him stronger, bothphysically and mentally.[]He read many books while in Tomingaj, and laterclaimed that Mark Twain's works had helped him to miraculously recover fromhis earlier illness.[]Tesla's baptismal record, c. 28 June1856.In 1875, Tesla enrolled at Austrian Polytechnic in Graz, Austria, on a MilitaryBorder scholarship. During his first year, Tesla never missed a lecture, earned thehighest grades possible, passed nine exams[][](nearly twice as many required[]),started a Serbian culture club,[]and even received a letter of commendation fromthe dean of the technical faculty to his father, which stated, "Your son is a star offirst rank".[]Tesla claimed that he worked from 3 a.m. to 11 p.m., no Sundays orholidays excepted.[]He was "mortified when [his] father made light of [those]hard won honors". After his father's death in 1879,[]Tesla found a package ofletters from his professors to his father, warning that unless he were removedfrom the school, Tesla would be killed through overwork.[]During his secondyear, Tesla came into conflict with Professor Poeschl over the Gramme dynamo,when Tesla suggested that commutators weren't necessary. At the end of hissecond year, Tesla lost his scholarship and became addicted to gambling.[][]During his third year, Tesla gambled away his allowance and his tuition money,later gambling back his initial losses and returning the balance to his family.Tesla claimed that he "conquered [his] passion then and there," but later he wasknown to play billiards in the US. When exam time came, Tesla was unpreparedand asked for an extension to study, but was denied. He never graduated from theuniversity and did not receive grades for the last semester.[]Tesla wearing the Serbian nationalcostume, c.1880.In December 1878, Tesla left Graz and severed all relations with his family tohide the fact that he dropped out of school.[]His friends thought that he had drowned in the Mur River.[]Tesla wentto Maribor (now in Slovenia), where he worked as a draftsman for 60 florins a month. He spent his spare timeplaying cards with local men on the streets.[]In March 1879, Milutin Tesla went to Maribor to beg his son to returnhome, but Nikola refused.[20]Nikola suffered a nervous breakdown at around the same time.[]Nikola Tesla4On 24 March 1879, Tesla was returned to Gospić under police guard for nothaving a residence permit. On 17 April 1879, Milutin Tesla died at the age of 60after contracting an unspecified illness[](although some sources claim that hedied of a stroke[21]). During that year, Tesla taught a large class of students inhis old school, Higher Real Gymnasium, in Gospić.[]In January 1880, two of Tesla's uncles put together enough money to help himleave Gospić for Prague where he was to study. Unfortunately, he arrived too lateto matriculate at Charles-Ferdinand University because he arrived too late to beable to enroll; he never studied Greek, a required subject; and he was illiterate inCzech, another required subject. Tesla did, however, attend lectures at theuniversity, although, as an auditor, he did not receive grades for thecourses.[22][23][24]Tesla aged 23, c.1879In 1881, Tesla moved to Budapest to work under Ferenc Puskas at a telegraph company, the Budapest TelephoneExchange. Upon arrival, Tesla realized that the company, then under construction, was not functional, so he workedas a draftsman in the Central Telegraph Office, instead. Within a few months, the Budapest Telephone Exchangebecame functional and Tesla was allocated the chief electrician position.[25]During his employment, Tesla mademany improvements to the Central Station equipment and claimed to have perfected a telephone repeater oramplifier, which was never patented nor publicly described.[]Working for EdisonIn 1882, Tesla began working for the Continental Edison Company in France, designing and making improvementsto electrical equipment.[26]In June 1884, Tesla relocated to New York City.[]During his trip across the Atlantic, his ticket, money, and some ofhis luggage were stolen, and he was nearly thrown overboard after a mutiny broke out on the ship.[27]He arrivedwith only four cents in his pocket, a letter of recommendation, a few poems, and the remainder of hisbelongings.[citationneeded]In the letter of recommendation from Charles Batchelor, a former employer, to Thomas Edison, it is claimed thatBatchelor wrote, "I know two great men and you are one of them; the other is this young man." (The exact contentsof the letter are disputed in McNichol's book.) Edison hired Tesla to work for his Edison Machine Works. Tesla'swork for Edison began with simple electrical engineering and quickly progressed to solving some of the company'smost difficult problems. Tesla was even offered the task of completely redesigning the Edison Company's directcurrent generators.[28]In 1885, Tesla claimed that he could redesign Edison's inefficient motor and generators, making an improvement inboth service and economy. According to Tesla, Edison remarked, "There's fifty thousand dollars in it for you—if youcan do it"[]—thishas been noted as an odd statement from an Edison whose company was stingy with pay and whodid not have that sort of cash on hand.[29]After months of work, Tesla fulfilled the task and inquired about payment.Edison, claiming that he was only joking, replied, "Tesla, you don't understand our American humor."[30][31]Instead,Edison offered a US$10 a week raise over Tesla's US$18 per week salary; Tesla refused the offer and immediatelyresigned.[]Nikola Tesla5Middle years (1886–1899)In 1886, Tesla formed his own company, Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing.[32]The company installed electricalarc light based illumination systems designed by Tesla and also had designs for dynamo electric machinecommutators, the first patents issued to Tesla in the US.[]Tesla proposed that the company should go on to develop his ideas foralternating current transmission systems and motors. The investors disagreed andeventually fired him, leaving him penniless; Tesla was forced to work as a ditchdigger for US$2 per day. Tesla considered the winter of 1886/1887 as a time of"terrible headaches and bitter tears". During this time, he questioned the value ofhis education.[][34]In April 1887, Tesla started a company, the Tesla Electric Company, with thebacking of New York attorney Charles F. Peck and Alfred S. Brown, the directorof Western Union. They set up a laboratory for Tesla at 89 Liberty Street inManhattan so he could work on his alternating current motor and other devicesfor power distribution, with an agreement that they share fifty-fifty with Teslaany profits generated from patents.[35]It was here, in 1887, that Teslaconstructed a brushless alternating current induction motor, based on a rotatingmagnetic field principle he claimed to have conceived of in 1882.[]He received aUS patent for the motor in May 1888.[36]At that time, many inventors weretrying to develop workable AC motors[]because AC's advantages in longdistance high voltage transmission were counterbalanced by the inability tooperate motors on AC. The rotating magnetic field induction motor seems toDrawing from U.S. Patent 381,968[33]have been an independent invention by Tesla, but it was not a unique discovery, illustrating principle of Tesla'salternating current motorat the time.[37]Italian physicist Galileo Ferraris published a paper on rotatingmagnetic field based induction motor on 11 March 1888,[38][][][39]a workingmodel of which he may have been demonstrating at the University of Turin as early as 1885.[40][41][42]In 1888, amonth before Tesla demonstrated his AC induction motor, Westinghouse engineer Oliver B. Shallenberger inventedan induction meter that was based on the same rotating magnetic field principle,[43][44]and during Tesla'sdemonstration English engineer Elihu Thomson stated he was working on an induction motor.[45]In 1888, the editor ofElectrical Worldmagazine, Thomas Commerford Martin (a friend and publicist), arranged forTesla to demonstrate his alternating current system, including his induction motor, at the American Institute ofElectrical Engineers (now IEEE).[46]Engineers working for the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Companyreported to George Westinghouse that Tesla had a viable AC motor and power system—something thatWestinghouse had been trying to secure. In July 1888, Brown and Peck negotiated a licensing deal with GeorgeWestinghouse for Tesla's polyphase induction motor and transformer designs for $60,000 in cash and stock and aroyalty of $2.50 per AC horsepower produced by each motor. Westinghouse also hired Tesla for one year for thelarge fee of $2,000 a month to be a consultant at the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company's Pittsburghlabs.[]During that year, Tesla worked in Pittsburgh, helping to create an alternating current system to power the city'sstreetcars. He found the time there frustrating because of conflicts between him and the other Westinghouseengineers over how to best implement AC power. Between them, they settled on a 60-cycle AC current system Teslaproposed (to match the working frequency of Tesla's motor), although they soon found that, since Tesla's inductionmotor could only run at a constant speed, it would not work for street cars. They ended up using a DC traction motor[47]instead. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]