My husband loves Nikola Tesla; our dog’s name is Tesla Coil (Tes) and we have a cat named Edison (Eddie). I picked up Tesla, Man out of time to read more about the man my husband admires. With Elon Musk’s Tesla Motor Company bring the Tesla name back in the mainstream there are a lot more people nowadays that know the name and know some of the wrongs committed against Tesla (primarily by Thomas Edison).
Tesla was a Serbian electrical engineer who emigrated to the United States in 1884 to work for Thomas Edison. While working in New York, Edison offered Tesla $50,000 to redesign some of Edison’s generators; after Tesla completed the challenge Edison chalked the offer up to his sense of humor. This caused a rift between the two and Tesla ended up forming his own laboratory after finding his own financial backers.
Throughout his life Tesla experimented with AC current, aviation, X Rays and radio; he had numerous patents that generated the income he used to finance his various projects. Unfortunately, despite selling most of his patents, Tesla died alone (save for his pigeons) and in debt at the age of 86. He actually didn’t receive credit for the invention of the radio until the Supreme Court reached a decision eight months after his death.
This biography was pretty dry. I wish I could say I came away with the same affection for Tesla that my husband feels for this wronged scientist but all I really gained was figuring out who the Faraday my husband wants to name our next pet after…
Have you read Empires of Light by Jill Jonnes? If not, I have a copy. It’s a much more riveting bio of Tesla (and all those other electricity dudes)