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Year 1857 (MDCCCLVII) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar and a common year starting on Tuesday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar.

Events[link]

January–March[link]

• January 1 – The biggest Estonian newspaper Postimees is established by Johann Voldemar Jannsen.
• January 7 – The partly French-owned London General Omnibus Company begins operating.^[1]
• January 9 – Fort Tejon earthquake: An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.9 strikes near Parkfield, California.
• January 24 – The University of Calcutta is established in Kolkata as the first multidisciplinary modern university in South Asia. The University of Bombay and one other are also established in the British Raj this year.
• January 29 *ndash; Victoria Cross established to acknowledge.
• February 3 – The National Deaf Mute College (later renamed Gallaudet University) is established in Washington, D.C., becoming the first school for the advanced education of the deaf.
• February 5 – Federal Constitution of the United Mexican States promulgated.^[2]
• March 3 – France and the United Kingdom formally declare war on China in the Second Opium War.
• March 3 – The largest slave auction in United States history, dubbed as 'The Weeping Time'. Over a 2-day period, Pierce M. Butler sells 436 men, women, children, and infants, all of whom were kept in stalls meant for horses at a racetrack in Savannah, Georgia, for weeks beforehand.^[3]
• March 4 – James Buchanan succeeds Franklin Pierce as President of the United States.
• March 6 – Dred Scott v. Sandford: The Supreme Court of the United States rules that Blacks are not citizens and slaves can not sue for freedom, driving the country further towards the American Civil War (the ruling is not overturned until the 14th Amendment in 1868).
• March 12 – Elizabeth Blackwell opens a hospital, the New York Infirmary for Indigent Women and Children.
• March 21 – An earthquake in Tokyo, Japan kills over 100,000.
• March 23 – Elisha Otis' first elevator is installed (at 488 Broadway, New York City).

April–June[link]

• April 4 – End of the Anglo-Persian War.
• April 18 – The Spirits' Book (Le Livre des Esprits), one of the Five Fundamental Works of Spiritism, is published by French educator Allan Kardec.
• May 5–October 17 – The Art Treasures of Great Britain exhibition is held in Manchester, one of the largest such displays of all time.^[4]
• May 10 – Indian rebellion of 1857: The 3rd Light Cavalry of the British East India Company's army rebels against its British officers, thus beginning the rebellion.
• May 11 – Indian rebellion of 1857: Indian combatants capture Delhi from the East India Company.
• June 6 – Sophia of Nassau marries the future King Oscar II of Sweden-Norway.

July–September[link]

• July 1–November 19 – Indian rebellion of 1857: Siege of Lucknow.
• July 15 – Indian rebellion of 1857: The second massacre at Kanpur takes place.
• July 18
  • The Utah Expedition leaves Fort Leavenworth, effectively beginning the Utah War.
  • Last use of prison hulks in the United Kingdom.^[5]
• August 28 – Matrimonial Causes Act makes divorce without parliamentary approval legally possible in the United Kingdom.^[6]
• September – Panic of 1857 begins: Speculation in U.S. railroad shares and collapse of the Ohio Life Insurance and Trust Company trigger a financial crisis which will extend to Europe.
• September 11 – Mountain Meadows massacre in Utah.
• September 12 – The SS Central America sinks off the coast of North Carolina, killing 425 people.
• September 20 India; British forces recapture Delhi,^[6] compelling the surrender of Bahadur Shah II, the last Mughal emperor.
• December 31 Canada; Queen Victoria chooses Ottawa as capital of Canada.

October–December[link]

• October 13 – Panic of 1857: New York banks close and do not reopen until December 12.
• October 24 – Sheffield F.C., the world's first association football team, is founded in Sheffield, England.
• November 30 – President of Mexico Ignacio Comonfort is succeeded by Félix María Zuloaga.
• December – Reform War in Mexico begins.
• December 16 – An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 6.9 kills 11,000 people in Naples, Italy.
• December 20 – Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria issues a decree, Es ist Mein Wille, which leads to the demolition of the city walls of Vienna, allowing the construction of the Ringstraße.
• December 31 – Queen Victoria chooses Ottawa, Ontario, as the capital of Canada.

Date unknown[link]

• The Mormons abandon Las Vegas, Nevada.
• Kuala Lumpur, the future capital of Malaysia, is founded as a tin mining settlement.
• Hollywood is founded.
• La Tene culture artifacts are discovered in Switzerland by Hansli Kopp.
• Illinois State University, the first public university in Illinois, is established in Normal, Illinois
• American politician William Daniel proposes the Local Option for prohibition.
• 1857–1924 – 7 out of 10 people who land in Argentina are single males between 13 and 40 years old.

Births[link]

January–June[link]

• January 4 – Émile Courtet, French caricaturist and animator (d. 1938)
• January 11 – William Gentles, US army private, known for killing Crazy Horse (d. 1932)
• January 26 – the 12th Dalai Lama (d. 1875)
• January 31 – George Jackson Churchward, GWR Chief mechanical engineer (d. 1933)
• February 13 – Almanzo James Wilder, American writer (d. 1949)
• February 22
  • Robert Baden-Powell, English founder of the Scouting movement (d. 1941)
  • Heinrich Hertz, German physicist (d. 1894)
• March 7 – Julius Wagner-Jauregg, Austrian neuroscientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1940)
• March 8 – Ruggero Leoncavallo, Italian composer (d. 1919)
• March 21 – Hunter Liggett, American general (d. 1935)
• March 27 – Karl Pearson, statistician (d. 1936)
• March 30 – Leon Charles Thevenin, French telegraph engineer (d. 1926)
• April 5 – Alexander of Battenberg, first Prince of Bulgaria (d. 1893)
• April 14 – Princess Beatrice, youngest child of Queen Victoria (d. 1944)
• April 22 – Paul Dresser, American songwriter (d. 1906)
• May 7 – William A. MacCorkle, Governor of West Virginia (d. 1930)
• May 13 – Ronald Ross, English physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1932)
• May 15 – Williamina Fleming, Scottish astronomer (d. 1911)
• May 19 – John Jacob Abel, American pharmacologist (d. 1938)
• May 24 – Richard Mansfield, Anglo-American stage actor (d. 1907)
• May 31 – Pope Pius XI (d. 1939)
• June 2
  • Edward Elgar, English composer (d. 1934)
  • Karl Adolph Gjellerup, Danish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1919)
• June 12 – Kate Lester, English stage & silent screen actress (d. 1924)
• June 30 – Friedrich von Ingenohl, German admiral (d. 1933)

July–December[link]

• July 11 – Alfred Binet, French Psychologist (Stanford-Binet IQ test) (d. 1911)
• July 22 – Shams-ul-haq Azeemabadi, Islamic scholar (d. 1911)
• July 23 – Carl Meinhof, German linguist (d. 1944)
• July 24
  • Henrik Pontoppidan, Danish writer, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1943)
  • Juan Vincente Gomez, former President of Venezuela (d. 1935)
• July 25 – Nat C. Goodwin, American actor (d. 1919)
• July 28 – Ballington Booth, Salvation Army Officer and co-founder of Volunteers of America (d. 1940)
• July 30
  • Lucy Bacon, Californian Impressionist painter (d. 1932)
  • Thorstein Veblen, Norwegian economist (d. 1929)
• August 14 – Max Wagenknecht, German composer (d. 1922)
• August 15 – Albert Ballin, German shipping magnate owner of the Hamburg America Line line (d. 1918)
• September 5 – Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Russian scientist and inventor (d. 1935)
• September 8 – Georg Michaelis, Chancellor of Germany (d. 1936)
• September 13
  • Michał Drzymała, Polish peasant and revolutionary (d. 1937)
  • Milton S. Hershey, American chocolate manufacturer (d. 1945)
• September 15 – William Howard Taft, 27th President of the United States (d. 1930)
• September 28 – Lewis Bayly, British admiral (d. 1938)
• October 5 – Peadar Mac Fhionnlaoich, Irish language writer (d. 1942)
• October 24 – Ned Williamson, American baseball player (d. 1894)
• November 5
  • Joseph Tabrar, British songwriter (d. 1931)
  • Ida Tarbell, American journalist (d. 1944)
• November 17 – George Marchant, English-born inventor, manufacturer, and philanthropist (d. 1941)
• November 26 – Ferdinand de Saussure, Swiss linguist (d. 1913)
• November 27 – Charles Scott Sherrington, English physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1952)
• November 28 – King Alfonso XII of Spain (d. 1885)
• December 3 &ndas; Joseph Conrad, Polish-British novelist (d. 1924)

Date unknown[link]

• Zübeyde Hanım, mother of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (d. 1923)

Deaths[link]

January–June[link]

• February 10 – David Thompson, British-Canadian explorer (b. 1770)
• February 15 – Mikhail Glinka, Russian composer (b. 1804)
• February 16 – Elisha Kent Kane, American explorer of the Arctic regions (b. 1820)
• March 11 – Manuel José Quintana, poet (b. 1772)
• March 26 – Thomas Peters, Dutch supercentenarian (b. 1745)
• May 2 – Alfred de Musset, French poet (b. 1810)
• May 11 – Eugène François Vidocq, French criminal and private detective (b. 1775)
• May 13 – Parley P. Pratt, early Latter Day Saint leader (murdered) (b. 1807)
• May 23 – Augustin Louis Cauchy, French mathematician (b. 1789)
• June 30 – Alcide d'Orbigny, naturalist (b. 1802)

July–December[link]

• July 4 – Henry Montgomery Lawrence, soldier and statesman (b. 1806)
• July 15 – Carl Czerny, Austrian composer (b. 1791)
• July 19 – Stefano Franscini, member of the Swiss Federal Council (b. 1796)
• July 29 – Charles Lucien Bonaparte, French naturalist and ornithologist (b. 1803)
• August 3 – Eugène Sue, French novelist (b. 1804)
• September 3 – John McLoughlin, Canadian trapper (b. 1784)
• September 5 – Auguste Comte, French philosopher (b. 1798)
• November 12 – Maximilian Spinola, entomologist (b. 1780)
• November 26 – Joseph von Eichendorff, German poet (b. 1788)
• December 3 – Christian Daniel Rauch, German sculptor (b. 1777)
• December 15 – Sir George Cayley, English aviation pioneer (b. 1773)

References[link]

Dred Scott
Born	1795 Unknown
Died	September 17, 1858 St. Louis, Missouri
Nationality	American

Dred Scott (1795 – September 17, 1858), was an African American slave in the United States who unsuccessfully sued for his freedom and that of his wife and their two daughters in the Dred Scott v. Sandford case of 1857, popularly known as "the Dred Scott Decision." His case was based on the fact that although he and his wife Harriet Scott were slaves, he had lived with his master Dr. John Emerson in states and territories where slavery was illegal according to both state laws and the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, including Illinois and Minnesota (which was then part of the Wisconsin Territory). The United States Supreme Court decided 7–2 against Scott, finding that neither he nor any other person of African ancestry could claim citizenship in the United States, and therefore Scott could not bring suit in federal court under diversity of citizenship rules. Moreover, Scott's temporary residence outside Missouri did not bring about his emancipation under the Missouri Compromise, which the court ruled unconstitutional as it would improperly deprive Scott's owner of his legal property.

While Chief Justice Roger B. Taney had hoped to settle issues related to slavery and Congressional authority by this decision, it aroused outrage and deepened sectional tensions. President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, and the post-Civil war Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments nullified the decision.

Overview[link]

The case raised the issue of the status of slaves who had been held while residents in a free state. Such states and territories held that a slaveholder forfeited his rights to property by illegally holding a slave to a state that prohibited the institution and where there was no law to support his controlling the slave. Congress had never before addressed whether slaves were free if they set foot upon free soil. The ruling overturned the Missouri Compromise as unconstitutional, since it ruled that as slavery was protected in the Constitution, Congress could not regulate it in the federal Territories and deprive a slave owner of his property without due process. This conclusion enraged the abolitionist Republicans and further exacerbated sectional sentiments that led to the American Civil War. Newspapers at this time covered the case very well, showing people's interest in the topic. Depending on the newspaper (southern or abolitionist) the reporters would either show approval or disapproval towards the decision to deny Scott his freedom.

Scott often traveled with his master Dr. John Emerson, a surgeon in the US Army, who was regularly transferred under Army command. Scott's stay with his master in Illinois, a free state, gave him the legal leverage to make a claim for freedom, as did his extended stay at Fort Snelling in the Wisconsin Territory (now Minnesota), where slavery was also prohibited. Scott did not file a petition for freedom while living in the free lands—perhaps because he was unaware of his rights at the time, or because he was afraid of the possible repercussions. After two years, the army transferred Emerson to territory where slavery was legal: first to St. Louis, Missouri, then to Louisiana. After getting married in Louisiana, Emerson commanded the Scotts to return to him. They could have refused the order by staying in the free territory of Wisconsin (now Minnesota), or by going to the free state of Illinois, but instead they went down the Mississippi River to Louisiana; a voyage of more than 1,000 miles (1,600 km). Emerson died in 1843; his widow directed Scott to work for another officer. At this change Scott sought freedom for his family and himself. He offered US$300, about $7,000 in current value, to Emerson's widow, Irene, but she refused to release him. Scott then went to the St. Louis Circuit Court to obtain his freedom.^[1]

Life[link]

In the late 1790s, Dred Scott was born into slavery in Southampton County, Virginia, as property to the Peter Blow family. From what experts can conclude, Scott was originally named Sam and had an older brother named Dred. However, when the brother died as a young man, Scott chose to take his brother's name instead. The Blow family settled near Huntsville, Alabama, where they unsuccessfully attempted farming.

In 1830 the Blow family took Scott with them when they relocated to St. Louis, Missouri. They sold him to John Emerson, a doctor serving in the United States Army.

Marriage and family[link]

In 1836 Dred Scott met a teen-aged slave named Harriet Robinson whose master was Major Lawrence Taliaferro, an army officer from Virginia. Taliaferro allowed Scott and Harriet to marry and transferred his ownership of Harriet to Dr. Emerson so the couple could be together. A couple of years later, Harriet gave birth to their first child, Eliza. In 1840, they had another daughter whom they named Lizzie. Eventually they would also have two sons, however, neither survived past infancy.

Dr. Emerson married Irene Sanford,^[2] and the Emersons and Scotts returned to Missouri in 1842. When Dr. Emerson died the following year, his widow took over the estate. Scott offered to purchase his freedom from the widow Emerson, but she refused his request.

Dred Scott case[link]

Having failed to purchase his freedom, in 1846 Scott filed legal suit in St Louis Circuit Court through the help of a local lawyer. Historical details about why Scott sought recourse in the court system are unclear. The Scott v. Emerson case was tried in 1847 in the federal-state courthouse in St. Louis. The judgment went against Scott, but having found evidence of hearsay, the judge called for a retrial.^{[citation needed]}

In 1850, a Missouri jury concluded that Scott and his wife should be granted freedom since they had been illegally held as slaves during their extended residence in the free jurisdictions of Illinois and Wisconsin. Irene Emerson appealed. In 1852, the Missouri Supreme Court struck down the lower court ruling, saying, "Times now are not as they were when the previous decisions on this subject were made." They ruled that the precedent of "once free always free" was no longer the case, overturning 28 years of legal precedent. They told the Scotts they should have sued for freedom in Wisconsin. Justice Hamilton R. Gamble, a future governor of the state, sharply disagreed with the majority decision and wrote a dissenting opinion. The Scotts were returned to their master's wife.

Under Missouri law at the time, after Dr. Emerson had died, powers of the Emerson estate were transferred to his wife's brother, John F. A. Sanford. Because Sanford was a citizen of New York, Scott's lawyers "claimed the case should now be brought before the Federal courts, on the grounds of diverse citizenship."^[3] With the assistance of new lawyers (including Montgomery Blair), the Scotts filed suit in the federal court.

After losing again in federal district court, they appealed to the United States Supreme Court in Dred Scott v. Sandford. (The name is spelled 'Sandford' in the court decision due to a clerical error.)

On March 6, 1857, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney delivered the majority opinion. Taney ruled that:

• Any person descended from Africans, whether slave or free, is not a citizen of the United States, according to the Constitution. (Note: Only 3/5ths of a state's slave population total was counted in their population total. Contrary to popular belief, slaves were not counted as 3/5ths of a person for purposes of congressional representation. They were considered property in historic records. There were free blacks in several of the 13 states when the Constitution was written. Their number increased dramatically in the Upper South in the first two decades after the Revolution; for instance, by 1810, fully 10 percent of the population in the Upper South were free blacks, as numerous slaveholders manumitted their slaves in this period, inspired by Revolutionary principles of equality.^[4])
• The Ordinance of 1787 could not confer either freedom or citizenship within the Northwest Territory to non-white individuals.
• The provisions of the Act of 1820, known as the Missouri Compromise, were voided as a legislative act, since the act exceeded the powers of Congress, insofar as it attempted to exclude slavery and impart freedom and citizenship to non-white persons in the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase.^[5]

The Court had ruled that African Americans had no claim to freedom or citizenship. Since they were not citizens, they did not possess the legal standing to bring suit in a federal court. As slaves were private property, Congress did not have the power to regulate slavery in the territories and could not revoke a slave owner's rights based on where he lived. This decision nullified the essence of the Missouri Compromise, which divided territories into jurisdictions either free or slave. Speaking for the majority, Taney ruled that because Scott was simply considered the private property of his owners, that he was subject to the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, prohibiting the taking of property from its owner "without due process".

The decision increased tensions between pro-slavery and anti-slavery factions in both North and South, further pushing the country towards the brink of civil war.^{[citation needed]}

Gravesite

Following the ruling, Scott and his family were returned to Emerson's widow. In the meantime, her brother John Sanford had been committed to an insane asylum. In 1850, Irene Sanford Emerson had remarried. Her new husband, Calvin C. Chaffee, was an abolitionist, who shortly after was elected to the US Congress. Chaffee was apparently unaware that his wife owned the most prominent slave in the United States until one month before the Supreme Court decision. By then it was too late for him to intervene, and Chaffee was harshly criticized for having been married to a slaveholder.^{[citation needed]} He was able to convince his wife Irene to return Scott to his original owners, the Blow family. By this time, The Blow family had relocated to Missouri and become opponents of slavery, granting the Scotts emancipation by Henry Taylor Blow on May 26, 1857, less than three months after the Supreme Court ruling.^{[citation needed]} Scott went to work as a porter in St. Louis for nearly 17 months before he died from tuberculosis in September 1858.^{[citation needed]} Scott was survived by his wife and his two daughters.

Scott was originally interred in Wesleyan Cemetery in St. Louis. When this cemetery was closed nine years later, Taylor Blow transferred Scott's coffin to a plot in the nearby Catholic cemetery, Calvary Cemetery, St. Louis, Missouri, which permitted burial of non-Catholic slaves by Catholic owners.^[6] A local tradition later developed of placing Lincoln pennies on top of Scott's gravestone for good luck.^[6]

Harriet Scott was long thought to be buried near her husband, but it was later proven that she was buried in Greenwood Cemetery in Hillsdale, Missouri. She outlived her husband by 18 years, dying on June 17, 1876.^[7]

Legacy[link]

• In 1997, Dred and Harriet Scott were inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame.

• Their daughter Eliza Scott married and had two sons. Lizzie never married, but following her sister's early death, she helped raise her nephews. One of Eliza's sons died young, but the other married and has descendants, some of whom still live in St. Louis as of 2010.^[8]

Aftermath[link]

• The Dred Scott Case ended the prohibition of slavery in federal territories and prohibited Congress from regulating slavery anywhere.^[9]
• The ruling of the court helped catalyze sentiment for Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation and the three constitutional amendments ratified shortly after the Civil War: the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth amendments, abolishing slavery, granting former slaves citizenship, and conferring citizenship to anyone born in the United States.^[9]

See also[link]

• Slavery in the United States
• Charlotte Dupuy
• Polly Berry
• Freedom suits

Further reading[link]

• Swain, Gwenyth (2004). Dred and Harriet Scott: A Family's Struggle for Freedom. Saint Paul, MN: Borealis Books. ISBN [[Special:BookSources/978-0-87351-483-1|978-0-87351-483-1]]. 
• Shurtleff, Mark (2009). Am I Not A Man? The Dred Scott Story. Orem, UT: Valor Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-935546-00-9. 
• Tsesis, Alexander (2008). We Shall Overcome: A History of Civil Rights and the Law. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-11837-7. 

References[link]

External links[link]

• "Dred Scott Case Collection": Official Court Documents and Supplementary Information, Washington University in St. Louis
• "Freedom Suits", African-American Life in St. Louis, 1804–1865, from the Records of the St. Louis Courts, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, National Park Service
• Revised Dred Scott Case Collection
• Christyn Elley, "Biography of Dred Scott", Missouri State Archives
• Full text of the Dred Scott v. Sandford, Supreme Court decision Findlaw
• Dred Scott v. Sandford and related resources, Library of Congress
• "Dred Scott Chronology", Washington University in St. Louis
• Harriet Scott's grave located, Afrigeneas Forum
• Dred Scott Heritage Foundation
• Mark Shurtleff, "Am I Not A Man? The Dred Scott Story"
•  "Scott, Dred". Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. 1900. 

Nikola Tesla
Tesla, aged 37, 1893, photo by Napoleon Sarony
Born	(1856-07-10)10 July 1856 Smiljan, Austrian Empire (Croatian Military Frontier)
Died	7 January 1943(1943-01-07) (aged 86) Manhattan, New York, USA
Residence	Manhattan, New York, USA Karlovac, Croatia Budapest, Hungary
Citizenship	Austrian Empire (10 July 1856 – 29 October 1918)[citation needed] United States (30 July 1891 – 7 January 1943)
Fields	Electrical engineering Mechanical engineering
Institutions	Edison Machine Works Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Co.
Alma mater	Graz University of Technology Charles University in Prague
Known for	Alternating current Bifilar coil Death ray Electrogravitics Induction motor Particle beam weapon Rotating magnetic field Teleforce Tesla coil Tesla electric car Tesla principle Tesla turbine Tesla's Egg of Columbus Tesla's oscillator Telegeodynamics Terrestrial stationary waves Wireless technology
Influences	Ernst Mach
Influenced	Gano Dunn
Notable awards	Order of St. Sava (1892) Elliott Cresson Medal (1894) Edison Medal (1916) John Scott Medal (1934)
Signature

Nikola Tesla (Serbian Cyrillic: Никола Тесла; 10 July 1856 – 7 January 1943) was a Serbian-American inventor, physicist, mechanical engineer, electrical engineer, and futurist. He was an important contributor to the use of commercial electricity, and is best known for developing the modern alternating current (AC) electrical supply system. His many revolutionary developments in the field of electromagnetism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were based on the theories of electromagnetic technology discovered by Michael Faraday. Tesla's patents and theoretical work also formed the basis of wireless communication and the radio.

Born in the village of Smiljan (now part of Gospić, present day Croatia), Tesla was a subject of the Austrian Empire by birth and later became an American citizen.^[1] Because of his 1894 demonstration of short range wireless communication through radio^[2] and as the eventual victor in the "War of Currents", he was widely respected as one of the greatest electrical engineers who worked in America.^[3] He pioneered modern electrical engineering and many of his discoveries were of groundbreaking importance. In the United States during this time, Tesla's fame rivaled that of any other inventor or scientist in history or popular culture.^[4] Tesla demonstrated wireless energy transfer to power electronic devices in 1891,^[5] and aspired to intercontinental wireless transmission of industrial power in his unfinished Wardenclyffe Tower project.

Tesla became reclusive towards the end of his life, living alone in a New York City hotel room and only appearing occasionally to make unusual statements to the press.^[6][7] Because of his pronouncements and the nature of his work over the years Tesla gained a reputation in popular culture as the archetypal "mad scientist".^[8][9] He died with little money to his name.^[10]

Tesla's work fell into relative obscurity after his death but since the 1990s his reputation has experienced a popular culture comeback.^[11] In 2005 he was listed amongst the top 100 nominees in the TV show "The Greatest American", an open access popularity poll conducted by AOL and The Discovery Channel.

The SI unit measuring magnetic field B (also referred to as the magnetic flux density and magnetic induction), the tesla, was named in his honor (at the CGPM, Paris, 1960).

Early years[link]

Nikola Tesla was born to Serbian parents in the village of Smiljan, Austrian Empire near the town of Gospić, in the territory of modern-day Croatia. His baptismal certificate reports that he was born on 28 June (N.S. 10 July) 1856 to father Milutin Tesla, a priest in the Serbian Orthodox Church.^[12] His mother was Đuka Tesla, née Mandić, whose father was also a Serbian Orthodox priest.^[13] She was talented in making home craft tools and memorized many Serbian epic poems, but never learned to read.^[14] Tesla's biographer John O'Neill relates that "the Tesla and Mandić families originally came from the western part of Serbia near Montenegro."^[15]

Nikola was the fourth of five children, having one older brother (Danilo, who was killed in a horse-riding accident when Nikola was five) and three sisters (Milka, Angelina and Marica).^[16] His family moved to Gospić in 1862. Tesla attended school at Higher Real Gymnasium in Karlovac.^[17] He finished a four-year term in the span of three years.^[18]

Nikola Tesla's house (parish hall) in village Smiljan where he was born and the church where his father served (present day Croatia).

Tesla went on to study electrical engineering at the Austrian Polytechnic in Graz (1875). While there, he studied the uses of alternating current. Some sources say he received Baccalaureate degrees from the university at Graz.^[19][20][21] However, the university says that he did not receive a degree and did not continue beyond the first semester of his third year, during which he stopped attending lectures.^{[22][23][24][25]} In December 1878, Tesla left Graz and broke all relations with his family. His friends thought that he had drowned in the Mur River. He went to Marburg, (today's Maribor, in Slovenia), where he was first employed as an assistant engineer for a year. He suffered a nervous breakdown during this time. Tesla was later persuaded by his father to attend the Charles-Ferdinand University in Prague, which he attended for the summer term of 1880. Here, he was influenced by Ernst Mach. However, after his father died, he left the university, having completed only one term.^[26]

Nikola Tesla c. 1879 at age 23, and his passport from 1883

Tesla engaged in reading many works, memorizing complete books, supposedly having a photographic memory.^[27] Tesla related in his autobiography that he experienced detailed moments of inspiration. During his early life, Tesla was stricken with illness time and time again. He suffered a peculiar affliction in which blinding flashes of light would appear before his eyes, often accompanied by visions. Much of the time the visions were linked to a word or idea he might have come across, at other times they would provide the solution to a particular problem he had been encountering; just by hearing the name of an item, he would be able to envision it in realistic detail. Modern-day synesthetes report similar symptoms. Tesla would visualize an invention in his mind with extreme precision, including all dimensions, before moving to the construction stage; a technique sometimes known as picture thinking. He typically did not make drawings by hand, instead just conceiving all ideas with his mind. Tesla also often had flashbacks to events that had happened previously in his life; these began during his childhood.^[27]

In 1880, he moved to Budapest to work under Tivadar Puskás in a telegraph company,^[28] the National Telephone Company. There, he met Nebojša Petrović, a young, Serbian inventor who lived in Austria. Although their encounter was brief, they did work on a project together using twin turbines to create continual power. On the opening of the telephone exchange in Budapest, 1881, Tesla became the chief electrician to the company, and was later engineer for the country's first telephone system. He also developed a device that, according to some, was a telephone repeater or amplifier, but according to others could have been the first loudspeaker.^[29]

Drawing from U.S. Patent 381968, illustrating principle of Tesla's alternating current motor

Working for Edison in France and the U.S[link]

In 1882 he moved to Paris, to work as an engineer for the Continental Edison Company, designing improvements to electric equipment brought overseas from Edison's ideas. According to Tesla's autobiography, in the same year he conceived of his induction motor and began developing various devices that use rotating magnetic fields for which he received patents in 1888. The paternity of the invention remains controversial since a prototype induction motor was demonstrated in Europe in 1885 by Galileo Ferraris.^{[30][31][32][33]} Ferraris published his findings in 1888.

On 6 June 1884, Tesla first arrived in the United States, in New York City^[34] with little besides a letter of recommendation from Charles Batchelor, a former employer. In the letter of recommendation to Thomas Edison, it is claimed that Batchelor wrote, 'I know two great men and you are one of them; the other is this young man', but the exact contents of the letter is disputed in McNichol's book. Edison hired Tesla to work for his Edison Machine Works. Tesla's work for Edison began with simple electrical engineering and quickly progressed to solving some of the company's most difficult problems. Tesla was even offered the task of completely redesigning the Edison company's direct current generators.^[35]

In 1885 Tesla claimed he could redesign Edison's inefficient motor and generators, making an improvement in both service and economy. According to Tesla, Edison remarked "There's fifty thousand dollars in it for you - if you can do it".^[36] This has been noted as an odd statement from an Edison whose company was stingy with pay and did not have that sort of cash on hand.^[37] After months of work when Tesla finished the task and inquired about payment Edison claimed he was only joking replying, "Tesla, you don't understand our American humor".^[38][39] Edison offered a $10 a week raise over Tesla's US$18 per week salary, but Tesla refused it and immediately resigned.^[36]

Tesla, in need of work, eventually found himself digging ditches for a short period of time for the Edison company. He used this time to focus on his AC polyphase system.^[40]

Middle years[link]

Wireless transmission of power and energy demonstration during his high frequency and potential lecture of 1891 Electromechanical devices and principles developed by Nikola Tesla: Various devices that use rotating magnetic fields (1882) The Induction motor, rotary transformers, and "high" frequency alternators The Tesla coil,[41] his magnifying transmitter, and other means for increasing the intensity of electrical oscillations (including condenser discharge transformations and the Tesla oscillators[42][43]) Alternating current long-distance electrical transmission system[44] (1888) and other methods and devices for power transmission Systems for wireless communication (prior art for the invention of radio) and radio frequency oscillators[45] Robotics and the electronic logic gate[46] Electrotherapy Tesla currents[47][48][49] Wireless transfer of electricity and the Tesla effect[50][51] Tesla impedance phenonomena[52] Tesla electro-static field Tesla principle Bifilar coil Telegeodynamics Tesla insulation Tesla impulses[53] Tesla frequencies[41] Tesla discharge[41] Forms of commutators and methods of regulating third brushes Tesla turbines (e.g., bladeless turbines) for water, steam and gas and the Tesla pumps Tesla igniter Corona discharge ozone generator Tesla compressor X-rays Tubes using the Bremsstrahlung process Devices for ionized gases and "Hot Saint Elmo's Fire".[54] Devices for high field emission Devices for charged particle beams Phantom streaming devices[55] Arc light systems Methods for providing extremely low level of resistance to the passage of electric current (predecessor to superconductivity) Voltage multiplication circuitry Devices for high voltage discharges Devices for lightning protection VTOL aircraft Dynamic theory of gravity Concepts for electric vehicles Polyphase systems

In 1886, Tesla formed his own company, Tesla Electric Light & Manufacturing. The initial financial investors disagreed with Tesla on his plan for an alternating current motor and eventually relieved him of his duties at the company. Tesla worked in New York as a laborer from 1886 to 1887 to feed himself and raise capital for his next project. In 1887, he constructed a brushless alternating current induction motor, which he demonstrated to the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (now IEEE) in 1888. In the same year, he developed the principles of his Tesla coil, and began working with George Westinghouse at Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company's Pittsburgh labs. Westinghouse listened to his ideas for polyphase systems which would allow transmission of alternating current electricity over long distances.

In April 1887, Tesla began investigating what would later be called X-rays using his own single terminal vacuum tubes (similar to his patent #514,170). This device differed from other early X-ray tubes in that it had no target electrode. The modern term for the phenomenon produced by this device is bremsstrahlung (or braking radiation). It is now known that this device operated by emitting electrons from the single electrode through a combination of field electron emission and thermionic emission. Once liberated, electrons are strongly repelled by the high electric field near the electrode during negative voltage peaks from the oscillating HV output of the Tesla Coil, generating X rays as they collide with the glass envelope. He also used Geissler tubes. By 1892, Tesla became aware of the skin damage that Wilhelm Röntgen later identified as an effect of X rays.

In the early research, Tesla devised several experimental setups to produce X-rays. Tesla held that, with his circuits, the "instrument will [... enable one to] generate Roentgen rays of much greater power than obtainable with ordinary apparatus".^[56]

He also commented on the hazards of working with his circuit and single-node X-ray-producing devices. Of his many notes in the early investigation of this phenomenon, he attributed the skin damage to various causes. He believed early on that damage to the skin was not caused by the Roentgen rays, but the ozone generated in contact with the skin, and to a lesser extent, nitrous acid. Tesla incorrectly held that x-rays were longitudinal waves, such as those produced in waves in plasma. There are known examples of this and these plasma waves can occur in the situation of force-free magnetic fields.^[57][58] His hypotheses and experiments were confirmed by others.^[59]

Tesla continued research in the field. He performed several experiments prior to Roentgen's discovery (including photographing the bones of his hand; later, he sent these images to Roentgen) but did not make his findings widely known; much of his research was lost in the 5th Avenue laboratory fire of March 1895.

Tesla demonstrated wireless energy transmission as early as 1891. The Tesla effect is a term for an application of this type of electrical conduction (that is, the movement of energy through space and matter, not just the production of voltage across a conductor).^[50][60]

American citizenship[link]

Tesla demonstrated a radio-controlled boat on 1898 U.S. Patent 613,809, named Method of an Apparatus for Controlling Mechanism of Moving Vehicle or Vehicles

On 30 July 1891, at the age of 35, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States. Tesla established his South Fifth Avenue laboratory in New York in the same year. Later, Tesla established his Houston Street laboratory in New York at 46 E. Houston Street. He lit electric lamps wirelessly at both of the New York locations, providing evidence for the potential of wireless power transmission.^[61]

Soon thereafter, in 1892,^[62] Tesla was awakened from a dream in which his mother had died.^[63] He returned to Europe for her funeral. After her death, Tesla fell ill. He spent two to three weeks recuperating in Gospić and the village of Tomingaj near Gračac, his mother's birthplace.

Some of Tesla's closest friends were artists. He befriended Century Magazine editor Robert Underwood Johnson, who adapted several Serbian poems of Jovan Jovanović Zmaj (which Tesla translated). Also during this time, Tesla was influenced by the Vedic philosophy (i.e., Hinduism) teachings of the Swami Vivekananda; so much so that, after his exposure to Hindu-Vedic thought, Tesla started using Sanskrit words to name some of his fundamental concepts regarding matter and energy.^[64]

Nikola Tesla's AC dynamo-electric machine (Electric generator) used to generate AC which is used to transport electricity across great distances. It is contained in U.S. Patent 390,721.

When Tesla was 36 years old, the first patents concerning the polyphase power system were granted. He continued research of the system and rotating magnetic field principles. Tesla served, from 1892 to 1894, as the vice president of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, the forerunner (along with the Institute of Radio Engineers) of the modern-day IEEE. From 1893 to 1895, he investigated high frequency alternating currents. He generated AC of one million volts using a conical Tesla coil and investigated the skin effect in conductors, designed tuned circuits, invented a machine for inducing sleep, invented a cordless gas discharge lamp, and transmitted electromagnetic energy without wires, building the first radio transmitter.^{[citation needed]} In St. Louis, Missouri, Tesla made a demonstration related to radio communication in 1893.^{[citation needed]} Addressing the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and the National Electric Light Association, he described and demonstrated in detail its principles. Tesla's demonstrations were written about widely through various media outlets. Tesla also investigated harvesting energy that is present throughout space. He believed that it was merely a question of time when men would succeed in attaching their machinery to the very wheelwork of nature, stating: "Ere many generations pass, our machinery will be driven by a power obtainable at any point of the universe."^[65]

At the 1893 World's Fair, the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, an international exposition was held which, for the first time, devoted a building to electrical exhibits. It was a historic event as Tesla and George Westinghouse introduced visitors to AC power by using it to illuminate the Exposition. On display were fluorescent lamps developed by Westinghouse^[66] and single node bulbs. An observer noted:

Within the room was suspended two hard-rubber plates covered with tin foil. These were about fifteen feet apart, and served as terminals of the wires leading from the transformers. When the current was turned on, the lamps or tubes, which had no wires connected to them, but lay on a table between the suspended plates, or which might be held in the hand in almost any part of the room, were made luminous. These were the same experiments and the same apparatus shown by Tesla in London about two years previous, "where they produced so much wonder and astonishment".^[67]

Tesla also explained the principles of the rotating magnetic field and induction motor by demonstrating how to make an egg made of copper stand on end in his demonstration of the device he constructed known as the "Egg of Columbus".

The Tesla generator was developed by Tesla in 1895, in conjunction with his developments concerning the liquefaction of air. Tesla knew from Lord Kelvin's discoveries that more heat is absorbed by liquefied air when it is re-gasified and used to drive something than is required by theory; in other words, that the liquefaction process is somewhat anomalous or 'over unity'.^[68] Just before Tesla's completion of his work and the filing of a patent application, Tesla's laboratory burned down, destroying all his equipment, models and inventions. Immediately after the fire, Carl von Linde, in Germany, filed a patent application for the same process.^[69]

A "world system" for "the transmission of electrical energy without wires" that depends upon the electrical conductivity of the earth was proposed, in which transmission in various natural media with current that passes between the two points are used to power devices. In a practical wireless energy transmission system using this principle, a high-power ultraviolet beam might be used to form a vertical ionized channel in the air directly above the transmitter-receiver stations.^{[citation needed]} The same concept is used in virtual lightning rods and the electrolaser electroshock weapon,^[70] and has been proposed for disabling vehicles.

Also in the late 1880s, Tesla and Thomas Edison became adversaries in part because of Edison's promotion of direct current (DC) for electric power distribution over the more efficient alternating current advocated by Tesla and Westinghouse. Until the development of the induction motor, AC's advantages for long distance high voltage transmission were counterbalanced by the inability to operate motors on AC.^{[citation needed]} As a result of the "War of Currents", Edison and Westinghouse went nearly bankrupt, so in 1897, Tesla released Westinghouse from contract, providing Westinghouse a break from Tesla's patent royalties. Also in 1897, Tesla researched radiation, which led to setting up the basic formulation of cosmic rays.^[71]

In 1897, at age 41, Tesla filed the first radio patent (U.S. Patent 645,576). A year later, he demonstrated a radio-controlled boat to the US military, believing that the military would want things such as radio-controlled torpedoes. Tesla claimed to have developed the "Art of Telautomatics", a form of robotics, as well as the technology of remote control.^[72] In 1898, he demonstrated a radio-controlled boat to the public during an electrical exhibition at Madison Square Garden. Tesla called his boat a "teleautomaton".^[73] In the same year, Tesla devised an "electric igniter" or spark plug for Internal combustion gasoline engines. He gained U.S. Patent 609,250, "Electrical Igniter for Gas Engines", on this mechanical ignition system. Tesla lived in the former Gerlach Hotel, renamed The Radio Wave building, at 49 W 27th St. (between Broadway and Sixth Avenue), Lower Manhattan, before the end of the century where he conducted the radio wave experiments. A commemorative plaque was placed on the building in 1977 to honor his work. Remote radio control remained a novelty until World War I and afterward, when a number of countries used it in military programs.

Colorado Springs[link]

Publicity picture of Nikola Tesla sitting in his laboratory in Colorado Springs with his "Magnifying transmitter" generating millions of volts. The arcs are about 7 meters (23 ft) long. (Tesla's notes identify this as a multiple exposure photograph.)

An experiment in Colorado Springs. This bank of lights is receiving power by means of electrodynamic induction from a nearby transmitter

A Colorado Springs experiment: here a grounded tuned coil in resonance with a distant transmitter illuminates a light near the bottom of the picture.

In 1899, Tesla decided to move and began research in Colorado Springs, Colorado in a lab located near Foote Ave. and Kiowa St.,^[74] where he would have room for his high-voltage, high-frequency experiments. Upon his arrival he told reporters that he was conducting wireless telegraphy experiments transmitting signals from Pikes Peak to Paris. Tesla's diary contains explanations of his experiments concerning the ionosphere and the ground's telluric currents via transverse waves and longitudinal waves.^[75] At his lab, Tesla proved that the earth was a conductor, and he produced artificial lightning (with discharges consisting of millions of volts, and up to 135 feet long).^[76] Tesla also investigated atmospheric electricity, observing lightning signals via his receivers. Reproductions of Tesla's receivers and coherer circuits show an unpredicted level of complexity (e.g., distributed high-Q helical resonators, radio frequency feedback, crude heterodyne effects, and regeneration techniques).^[77] Tesla stated that he observed stationary waves during this time.^[78]

Tesla researched ways to transmit power and energy wirelessly over long distances (via transverse waves, to a lesser extent, and, more readily, longitudinal waves). He transmitted extremely low frequencies through the ground as well as between the Earth's surface and the Kennelly–Heaviside layer. He received patents on wireless transceivers that developed standing waves by this method. In his experiments, he made mathematical calculations and computations based on his experiments and discovered that the resonant frequency of the Earth was approximately 8 hertz (Hz). In the 1950s, researchers confirmed that the resonant frequency of the Earth's ionospheric cavity was in this range (later named the Schumann resonance).

In Colorado Springs Tesla carried out various long distance wireless transmission-reception experiments. Tesla effect is the application of a type of electrical conduction (that is, the movement of energy through space and matter; not just the production of voltage across a conductor). Through longitudinal waves,^{[citation needed]} Tesla transferred energy to receiving devices. He sent electrostatic forces through natural media across a conductor situated in the changing magnetic flux and transferred electrical energy to a wireless receiver.

In the Colorado Springs lab, Tesla observed unusual signals that he later thought may have been evidence of extraterrestrial radio wave communications coming from Venus or Mars.^[79] He noticed repetitive signals from his receiver which were substantially different from the signals he had noted from storms and earth noise. Specifically, he later recalled that the signals appeared in groups of one, two, three, and four clicks together. Tesla had mentioned that he thought his inventions could be used to talk with other planets. There have even been claims that he invented a "Teslascope" for just such a purpose. It is debatable what type of signals Tesla received or whether he picked up anything at all. Research has suggested that Tesla may have had a misunderstanding of the new technology he was working with,^[80] or that the signals Tesla observed may have been non-terrestrial natural radio source such as the Jovian plasma torus signals.^[81]

Tesla left Colorado Springs on 7 January 1900. The lab was torn down ca. 1905 and its contents sold to pay debts. The Colorado experiments prepared Tesla for the establishment of the trans-Atlantic wireless telecommunications facility known as Wardenclyffe near Shoreham, Long Island.

Wardenclyffe years[link]

In 1900, with US$150,000 (51% from J. Pierpont Morgan), Tesla began planning the Wardenclyffe Tower facility. In June 1902, Tesla's lab operations were moved to Wardenclyffe from Houston Street. The tower was dismantled for scrap during World War I.^[82]

On his 50th birthday in 1906, Tesla demonstrated his 200 hp (150 kW) 16,000 rpm bladeless turbine. During 1910–1911 at the Waterside Power Station in New York, several of his bladeless turbine engines were tested at 100–5000 hp.

Nobel prize and Tesla[link]

Since the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Guglielmo Marconi for radio in 1909, Thomas Edison and Tesla were mentioned in a press dispatch as potential laureates to share the Nobel Prize of 1915, leading to one of several Nobel Prize controversies. Some sources have claimed that because of their animosity toward each other neither was given the award, despite their scientific contributions; that each sought to minimize the other's achievements and right to win the award; that both refused ever to accept the award if the other received it first; and that both rejected any possibility of sharing it.^[14][83]

In the years after these rumors, neither Tesla nor Edison won the Prize (although Edison did receive one of 38 possible bids in 1915, and Tesla did receive one bid out of 38 in 1937).^[84] Earlier, Tesla alone was rumored to have been nominated for the Nobel Prize of 1912. The rumored nomination was primarily for his experiments with tuned circuits using high-voltage high-frequency resonant transformers.

Later years[link]

In 1915, Tesla filed a lawsuit against Marconi attempting, unsuccessfully, to obtain a court injunction against Marconi's claims. After Wardenclyffe, Tesla built the Telefunken Wireless Station in Sayville, Long Island. Some of what he wanted to achieve at Wardenclyffe was accomplished with the Telefunken Wireless. In 1917, the facility was seized and torn down by the Marines, because it was suspected that it could be used by German spies.

The Wardenclyffe Tower facility

Before World War I (1914-1918), Tesla looked overseas for investors to fund his research. When the war started, Tesla lost the funding he was receiving from his patents in European countries. After the war ended, Tesla made predictions regarding the relevant issues of the post-World War I environment, in a printed article (20 December 1914). Tesla believed that the League of Nations was not a remedy for the times and issues. Tesla started to exhibit pronounced symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder in the years following. He became obsessed with the number three; he often felt compelled to walk around a block three times before entering a building, demanded a stack of three folded cloth napkins beside his plate at every meal, etc. The nature of OCD was little understood at the time and no treatments were available, so his symptoms were considered by some to be evidence of partial insanity, and this undoubtedly hurt what was left of his reputation.

At this time, he was staying at The Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, renting in an arrangement for deferred payments. Eventually, the Wardenclyffe deed was turned over to George Boldt, proprietor of the Waldorf-Astoria, to pay a US$20,000 debt. In 1917, around the time that the Wardenclyffe Tower was demolished by Boldt to make the land a more viable real estate asset, Tesla received AIEE's highest honor, the Edison Medal.

Tesla, in August 1917, first established principles regarding frequency and power level for the first primitive radar units.^[85]

In 1934, Émile Girardeau, working with the first French radar systems, stated he was building them "according to the principles stated by Tesla". By the 1920s, Tesla was reportedly negotiating with the United Kingdom government about a ray system.^{[citation needed]} Tesla had also stated that efforts had been made to steal the so called "death ray".^{[citation needed]} It is suggested that the removal of the Chamberlain government ended negotiations.^{[citation needed]}

On Tesla's 75th birthday in 1931, Time magazine put him on its cover. The cover caption noted his contribution to electrical power generation. Tesla received his last patent in 1928 for an apparatus for aerial transportation which was the first instance of VTOL aircraft. By the end of 1931, Tesla released "On Future Motive Power" which covered an ocean thermal energy conversion system. In 1934, Tesla wrote to consul Janković of his homeland. The letter contained a message of gratitude to Mihajlo Pupin who had initiated a donation scheme by which American companies could support Tesla. Tesla refused the assistance, choosing instead to live on a modest pension received from Yugoslavia, and to continue his research.

Tesla's famous telegram exchange with Vladko Maček is preserved in the Technical Museum in Zagreb, Croatia

In 1936, replying to a birthday telegram from Vladko Maček, Tesla said he was "equally proud" of his "Serbian origin and Croatian homeland",^[86] a phrase often paraphrased in conciliatory context at modern-day joint Croatian-Serbian Tesla celebrations.^[87] In addition, in the same telegram, Tesla wrote "Long live all Yugoslavs."^{[citation needed]} When others tried to co-opt him into ethnic and other conflicts in Yugoslavia, Tesla once replied: "If your hate could be turned into electricity, it would light up the whole world."^[86]

Field theories[link]

When he was 81, Tesla stated he had completed a "dynamic theory of gravity".^[88] He stated that it was "worked out in all details" and that he hoped to soon give it to the world.^[89] The theory was never published.

The bulk of the theory was developed between 1892 and 1894, during the period that he was conducting experiments with high frequency and high potential electromagnetism and patenting devices for their use. Reminiscent of Mach's principle, Tesla stated in 1925 that:

Nikola Tesla, with Ruđer Bošković's book Theoria Philosophiae Naturalis, sits in front of the spiral coil of his high-frequency transformer at East Houston Street, New York.

There is no thing endowed with life—from man, who is enslaving the elements, to the nimblest creature—in all this world that does not sway in its turn. Whenever action is born from force, though it be infinitesimal, the cosmic balance is upset and the universal motion results.

Tesla was critical of Einstein's relativity work, calling it:

...[a] magnificent mathematical garb which fascinates, dazzles and makes people blind to the underlying errors. The theory is like a beggar clothed in purple whom ignorant people take for a king ... its exponents are brilliant men but they are metaphysicists rather than scientists ...^[90]

Tesla also argued:

I hold that space cannot be curved, for the simple reason that it can have no properties. It might as well be said that God has properties. He has not, but only attributes and these are of our own making. Of properties we can only speak when dealing with matter filling the space. To say that in the presence of large bodies space becomes curved is equivalent to stating that something can act upon nothing. I, for one, refuse to subscribe to such a view.^[91]

Tesla also believed that much of Albert Einstein's relativity theory had already been proposed by Ruđer Bošković, stating in an unpublished interview:

...the relativity theory, by the way, is much older than its present proponents. It was advanced over 200 years ago by my illustrious countryman Ruđer Bošković, the great philosopher, who, notwithstanding other and multifold obligations, wrote a thousand volumes of excellent literature on a vast variety of subjects. Bošković dealt with relativity, including the so-called time-space continuum ...'.^[92]

Directed-energy weapon[link]

Later in life, Tesla made remarkable claims concerning a "teleforce" weapon.^[93] The press called it a "peace ray" or death ray.^[94][95] In total, the components and methods included:^{[96][97][dubious – discuss]}

• An apparatus for producing manifestations of energy in free air instead of in a high vacuum as in the past. This, according to Tesla in 1934, was accomplished.
• A mechanism for generating tremendous electrical force. This, according to Tesla, was also accomplished.
• A means of intensifying and amplifying the force developed by the second mechanism.
• A new method for producing a tremendous electrical repelling force. This would be the projector, or gun, of the invention.

Tesla worked on plans for a directed-energy weapon from the early 1900s until his death.^{[dubious – discuss]} In 1937, Tesla wrote a treatise entitled "The Art of Projecting Concentrated Non-dispersive Energy through the Natural Media", which concerned charged particle beams.^{[98][dubious – discuss]} Tesla published the document in an attempt to expound on the technical description of a "superweapon that would put an end to all war." This treatise describing the particle beam is currently in the Nikola Tesla Museum archive in Belgrade. It describes an open-ended vacuum tube with a gas jet seal that allows particles to exit, a method of charging particles to millions of volts, and a method of creating and directing nondispersive particle streams (through electrostatic repulsion).^{[98][dubious – discuss]}

His records indicate that the device is based on a narrow stream of atomic clusters of liquid mercury or tungsten accelerated via high voltage (by means akin to his magnifying transformer). Tesla gives the following description concerning the particle gun's operation:

[The nozzle would] send concentrated beams of particles through the free air, of such tremendous energy that they will bring down a fleet of 10,000 enemy airplanes at a distance of 200 miles from a defending nation's border and will cause armies to drop dead in their tracks.^[99]

Tesla described the weapon as being able to be used against ground based infantry or for antiaircraft purposes.^[100] Tesla tried to interest the US War Department in the device.^[101] He also offered this invention to European countries.^[102] None of the governments purchased a contract to build the device. He was unable to act on his plans.^[103]

Theoretical inventions[link]

Another of Tesla's theorized inventions is commonly referred to as Tesla's Flying Machine, which appears to resemble an ion-propelled aircraft.^[104] Tesla claimed that one of his life goals was to create a flying machine that would run without the use of an airplane engine, wings, ailerons, propellers, or an onboard fuel source. Initially, Tesla pondered about the idea of a flying craft that would fly using an electric motor powered by grounded base stations. As time progressed, Tesla suggested that perhaps such an aircraft could be run entirely electro-mechanically. The theorized appearance would typically take the form of a cigar or saucer.^[105]

Personal life[link]

Nikola Tesla's father Milutin, Serbian Orthodox priest in the village of Smiljan.

Possessing an eidetic memory, Nikola Tesla was a polyglot, and along with his native tongue he also spoke Czech, English, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, and Latin.^[106]

During his second year of study at Graumltz, Tesla developed a passion for (and became very proficient at) billiards, chess and card-playing, sometimes spending more than 48 hours in a stretch at a gaming table.^[107][108] Tesla by nature required little sleep, claiming to never sleep more than two hours.^[109] On one occasion at his laboratory Tesla worked for a period of 84 hours without sleep or rest.^[110]

Tesla may have suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder, and had many unusual quirks and phobias. He did things in threes, and was adamant about staying in a hotel room with a number divisible by three. Tesla was physically revolted by jewelry, notably pearl earrings.^[111] He was fastidious about cleanliness and hygiene, and was by all accounts mysophobic.

Tesla was obsessed with pigeons, ordering special seeds for the pigeons he fed in Central Park and even bringing injured ones into his hotel room to nurse them back to health. Tesla was an animal-lover, often reflecting contentedly about a childhood cat, "The Magnificent Mačak." Tesla never married. He was celibate and claimed that his chastity was very helpful to his scientific abilities.^[27] Nonetheless there have been numerous accounts of women vying for Tesla's affection, even some madly in love with him. Tesla, though polite, behaved rather ambivalently to these women in the romantic sense.

Tesla was prone to alienating himself and was generally soft-spoken. However, when he did engage in a social life, many people spoke very positively and admiringly of him. Robert Underwood Johnson described him as attaining a "distinguished sweetness, sincerity, modesty, refinement, generosity, and force." His loyal secretary, Dorothy Skerrit, wrote: "his genial smile and nobility of bearing always denoted the gentlemanly characteristics that were so ingrained in his soul." Tesla's friend Hawthorne wrote that "seldom did one meet a scientist or engineer who was also a poet, a philosopher, an appreciator of fine music, a linguist, and a connoisseur of food and drink."

Nevertheless, Tesla could be harsh at times; he openly expressed his disgust for overweight people, once firing a secretary because of her weight.^[112] He was quick to criticize others' clothing as well, on several occasions directing a subordinate to go home and change her dress.^[27]

Tesla was widely known for his great showmanship, presenting his innovations and demonstrations to the public as an artform, almost like a magician. This seems to conflict with his observed reclusiveness; Tesla was a complicated figure. He refused to hold conventions without his Tesla coil blasting electricity throughout the room, despite the audience often being terrified, though he assured them everything was perfectly safe.

Mark Twain in Tesla's lab, early 1894

In middle age, Tesla became close friends with Mark Twain. They spent a lot of time together in his lab and elsewhere.

Tesla remained bitter in the aftermath of his dispute with Edison. The day after Edison died the New York Times contained extensive coverage of Edison's life, with the only negative opinion coming from Tesla, who was quoted as saying:

He had no hobby, cared for no sort of amusement of any kind and lived in utter disregard of the most elementary rules of hygiene  ... His method was inefficient in the extreme, for an immense ground had to be covered to get anything at all unless blind chance intervened and, at first, I was almost a sorry witness of his doings, knowing that just a little theory and calculation would have saved him 90 percent of the labor. But he had a veritable contempt for book learning and mathematical knowledge, trusting himself entirely to his inventor's instinct and practical American sense.^[113]

Shortly before he died, Edison said that his biggest mistake had been in trying to develop direct current, rather than the superior alternating current system that Tesla had put within his grasp.^[114]

Tesla was good friends with Robert Underwood Johnson. He had amicable relations with Francis Marion Crawford, Stanford White, Fritz Lowenstein, George Scherff, and Kenneth Swezey. He ripped up a Westinghouse contract that would have made him the world's first billionaire, in part because of the implications it would have on his future vision of free power, and in part because it would run Westinghouse out of business, and Tesla had no desire to deal with the creditors.^{[citation needed]}

Tesla lived the last ten years of his life in a two-room suite on the 33rd floor of the Hotel New Yorker, room 3327. There, near the end of his life, Tesla showed signs of encroaching senility, claiming to be visited by a specific white pigeon daily. Several biographers note that Tesla viewed the death of the pigeon as a "final blow" to himself and his work.

Tesla believed that war could not be avoided until the cause for its recurrence was removed, but was opposed to wars in general. However, Tesla came to find exceptions in which he thought certain situations and wars were justifiable.^[115] Tesla sought to reduce distance, such as in communication for better understanding, transportation, and transmission of energy, as a means to ensure friendly international relations.^[116]

Tesla was a life-long bachelor. Like many of his era, he became a proponent of an imposed selective breeding version of eugenics. His opinions stemmed from a belief that humans already interfered with the natural "ruthless workings of nature", rather than conceptions of a "master race" or inherent superiority of one person over another. His advocacy of it was however to push it further. In a 1937 interview, he stated:

... man's new sense of pity began to interfere with the ruthless workings of nature. The only method compatible with our notions of civilization and the race is to prevent the breeding of the unfit by sterilization and the deliberate guidance of the mating instinct .... The trend of opinion among eugenists is that we must make marriage more difficult. Certainly no one who is not a desirable parent should be permitted to produce progeny. A century from now it will no more occur to a normal person to mate with a person eugenically unfit than to marry a habitual criminal.^[117]

In 1926, Tesla commented on the ills of the social subservience of women and the struggle of women toward gender equality, indicated that humanity's future would be run by "Queen Bees". He believed that women would become the dominant sex in the future.^[118]

In his later years Tesla became a vegetarian. In an article for Century Illustrated Magazine he wrote: "It is certainly preferable to raise vegetables, and I think, therefore, that vegetarianism is a commendable departure from the established barbarous habit." Tesla argued that it is wrong to eat uneconomic meat when large numbers of people are starving; he also believed that plant food was "superior to [meat] in regard to both mechanical and mental performance". He also argued that animal slaughter was "wanton and cruel".^[119]

In his final years he suffered from extreme sensitivity to light, sound and other influences.^[120]

Death[link]

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Gilded urn with Tesla's ashes, in his favorite geometrical object of sphere, Nikola Tesla Museum, Belgrade.

Tesla died on 7 January 1943 at age 86 from heart thrombus, alone in room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel.^[121] A few days after Tesla's death, the information center of the Yugoslav royal government-in-exile released a statement giving a short review of Tesla's achievements and the schedule for his memorial service and funeral. The speech, written by Louis Adamic, was read in a live broadcast on Radio New York by the mayor of New York City, Fiorello La Guardia, on 10 January 1943. The remains of Nikola Tesla were taken to Campbell cemetery. The protocol anticipated the funeral service would be conducted on 12 January in the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in Manhattan.^[122] Bishop William T. Manning delivered the introductory and the last prayer in English. The funeral service was conducted in the name of the Serbian Orthodox Church by priest Dusan Sukletovic, the superior of the Church of St. Sava of the New York parish. The bereaved family members present at the funeral were Sava Kosanovic and Nikola Trbojevic. A state funeral was attended by 2000 people. Tesla's casket was draped with U. S. and Yugoslav flags. The pallbearers were Nobel prize winners. Telegrams of condolence were received from many notables including the First Lady of the United States, Mrs Eleanor Roosevelt and Vice-President Henry A. Wallace. Tesla's body was cremated and his ashes taken to Belgrade, Serbia, then-Yugoslavia in 1957. The urn containing his ashes was placed in the Nikola Tesla Museum in Belgrade. Despite having sold his AC electricity patents, Tesla died with significant debts. Later that year the US Supreme Court upheld Tesla's patent number 645576 in a ruling that served as the basis for patented radio technology in the United States.^[123]

Soon after his death Tesla's safe was opened by his nephew Sava Kosanović. Shortly thereafter Tesla's papers and other property were impounded by the United States' Alien Property Custodian office in Tesla's compound at the Manhattan Warehouse, even though he was a naturalized citizen.

Dr. John G. Trump was the main government official who went over Tesla's secret papers after his death in 1943. At the time, Trump was a well-known electrical engineer serving as a technical aide to the National Defense Research Committee of the Office of Scientific Research & Development, Technical Aids, Div. 14, NTRC (predecessor agency to the CIA's Office of Scientific Intelligence). Trump was also a professor at M.I.T., and had his feelings hurt by Tesla's 1938 review and critique of M.I.T.'s huge Van de Graaff generator with its two thirty-foot towers and two 15-foot-diameter (4.6 m) balls, mounted on railroad tracks—which Tesla showed could be out-performed in both voltage and current by one of his tiny coils about two feet tall.^{[124][dubious – discuss]} Trump was asked to participate in the examination of Tesla's papers at the Manhattan Warehouse & Storage Co. Trump reported afterwards that no examination had been made of the vast amount of Tesla's property that had been in the basement of the New Yorker Hotel ten years prior to Tesla's death, or of any of his papers, except those in his immediate possession at the time of his death. Trump concluded in his report that there was nothing that would constitute a hazard in unfriendly hands.

After the FBI was contacted by the War Department, his papers were declared to be top secret. The personal effects were sequestered on the advice of presidential advisers; J. Edgar Hoover declared the case most secret, because of the nature of Tesla's inventions and patents.^[125] One document stated that "[he] is reported to have some 80 trunks in different places containing transcripts and plans having to do with his experiments [...]". Altogether, in Tesla's effects, there were the contents of his safe, two truckloads of papers and apparatuses from his hotel, another 75 packing crates and trunks in a storage facility, and another 80 large storage trunks in another storage facility. The Navy and several "federal officials" spent two days microfilming some of the material at the Office of Alien Properties storage facility in 1943, and that was it, until Oct., 1945.^[126]

Tesla's family and the Yugoslav embassy struggled with the American authorities to gain these items after his death because of the potential significance of some of his research. Eventually Mr. Kosanović won possession of the materials, which are now housed in the Nikola Tesla Museum.^[127]

Literary works[link]

Apart from doing pure work on inventing things, Tesla also wrote a number of books and articles for magazines and journals.^[128] Among his books are My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla, The Fantastic Inventions of Nikola Tesla and The Tesla Papers.

A number of Tesla's writings are freely available on the web,^{[129][130][131]} including the article The Problem of Increasing Human Energy which he wrote for The Century Magazine,^[132][133] and the article Experiments With Alternate Currents Of High Potential And High Frequency published in his book Inventions, Researches and Writings of Nikola Tesla.^[134][135]

Legacy and honors[link]

Nikola Tesla on contemporary 100 Serbian dinar banknote.

Nikola Tesla Corner in New York

• The tesla (symbol T) – compound derived SI unit of magnetic flux density.^[136]
• Tesla – a crater on the far side of the moon of 26 kilometers in diameter at −2,0° width, −132.0° height.^[137]
• 2244 Tesla – a minor planet.^[137]
• TPP Nikola Tesla – the largest power plant in Serbia.
• The rock band Tesla takes its name from Nikola Tesla.^[138]
• An electric car company, Tesla Motors, named their company in tribute to Tesla.^[139]
• The Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport is named in his honor.^[140]
• Google honoured Tesla on his birthday on 10 July 2009 by displaying a doodle in the Google search home page, that showed the G as a tesla coil.^[141][142]
• The Czechoslovakian electro-technical company Tesla
• Tesla Motors, a manufacturer of electric cars based in Palo Alto, California, is named for him.
• The street sign “Nikola Tesla Corner” at the corner of the 40th Street and 6th Avenue in Manhattan
• The United States Postal Service honored Tesla with a commemorative stamp in 1983.
• Tesla was inducted into the Inventor’s Hall of Fame in 1975.
• The Nikola Tesla Award^[143]

Monuments[link]

Nikola Tesla monument by Les Drysdale in Niagara Falls, Ontario.

The Nikola Tesla Memorial Centre located in his birthplace of Smiljan near the town of Gospić in Croatia opened in 2006 features a statue of Tesla designed by sculptor Mile Blažević.^[144][145] On 7 July 2006 on the corner of Masarykova and Preradovićeva streets in the Lower Town area in Zagreb the monument to Tesla was unveiled. This monument was designed by Ivan Meštrović in 1952 and was transferred from the Zagreb-based Ruđer Bošković Institute where it had spent previous decades.

A monument to Tesla was established at Niagara Falls, New York. This monument, sculpted by Frano Kršinić and portraying Tesla reading a set of notes, was presented to the United States by Yugoslavia in 1976 and is an identical copy of the monument standing in front of the University of Belgrade Faculty of Electrical Engineering. Another monument to Tesla, featuring him standing on a portion of an alternator, was established at Queen Victoria Park in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada. The monument was officially unveiled on 9 July 2006 on the 150th anniversary of Tesla's birth. The monument was sponsored by St. George Serbian Church, Niagara Falls, and designed by Les Drysdale of Hamilton, Ontario. Drysdale's design was the winning design from an international competition.

In 1994, acting on the advice of the President's Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, a formal nomination process was initiated by the Tesla Wardenclyffe Project seeking placement of the Wardenclyffe laboratory-office building and the Tesla tower foundation on both the New York State and National Registers of Historic Places. This would result in the creation of a monument to Tesla out of the Wardenclyffe site itself.^[146]

Portrayals in popular culture[link]

Nikola Tesla has appeared in popular culture as a character in books, films, radio, TV, music, live theatre, comics and video games. The lack of recognition received by Tesla during his own lifetime has made him a tragic and inspirational character well suited to dramatic fiction. The impact of the technologies invented by Tesla is a recurring theme in several types of science fiction.

See also[link]

Electronics portal

• Electrical Experimenter
• List of Tesla patents
• Timeline of low-temperature technology

References[link]

Notes[link]