Nikola Tesla
... Batchelor and a package of calculations. “To be sure, at twenty-eight he was already one of the world’s greatest inventors. But not another soul knew it. (Cheney 26)” When Tesla stepped off the boat in America he went straight past the immigration hall and right towards Edison’s door. When he arrived, Edison was beginning to be spread very thin on account of expanding so quickly and for the many electrical fires and failures that his DC current was causing. Unfortunately they got off on the bad foot from the start, in Batchelor’s letter it said “there are two great men I know you(Edison) are one and the other(Tesla) is standing right in front of you.” and from there started a rocky relationship that would ultimately lead to their parting. But while Tesla was working for Edison , he was able to repair many of the broken generators that Edison had installed and in time he had found ways to improve them so that they were more efficient and less costly. When Edison found this out he made Tesla an offer; for repairing all of his generators Edison would give him fifty-thousand dollars, and this was in late 1800's. It took Tesla almost a year to complete this task and when he went to Edison to collect his money he got only this answer: Tesla, you don’t understand our American humor (Cheney).” After this he was approached by a group of investors who had heard of the good work he had been doing and offered him a company under his own name. But alas he would still not me able to start his Alternating Current for his investors were a bit more modest and wanting him to improve arc lights first for streets and factories, and so The Tesla Electric Light Company was formed, He developed a light that was “simple, reliable, safe, and economical.” Tesla’s was to be paid in shares of his company, but he only found himself be pushed out of the company and once again betrayed. Lady luck was done with him yet, because he then met a Mr. A. K. Brown who was the manager of the western telegraph office. But unlike Edison, Brown wanted AC to succeed and so was founded the second company in Tesla’s name, The Tesla Electric company (Smithsonian). Tesla was now allowed to start inventing but to the frustration of his assistants he never drew out diagrams, he would always build it in his head and then build a working model of it often having to hand make his own parts and tools because nothing like them existed. It was at this time he met Westinghouse who as legend has it made Tesla an offer of one million dollars for all of his AC patents. But record show that he was given 60,000 dollars for forty of his patents. And as Westinghouse historical records show Tesla was to be paid 2.50 per horsepower of electricity sold. And now his AC current could be put on the market. He was also made an American citizen in this time. Which he supposedly held higher than any of the honorary degrees that were bestowed upon him. This is also when the war of the electric companies started. Each trying to prove that the others form of electricity was inferior, or dangerous. Edison had started reports that AC current was dangerous because it had a higher voltage and could easily kill someone, he tested this by placing dogs and cats that were rounded up from around the area on a large sheet of metal which was then charged with Tesla’s AC current, and what resulted was far less than humane. And then the use of the Electric chair came into play, Edison and his supporters telling people that they would want something that was dangerous enough to kill a man in their homes. Only this was to be answered by Tesla giving a public demonstration in which he hooked himself up to an AC current and came away unharmed. One of his side projects during this time was the invention of radio signals, which he demonstrated to a crowd by means of a remote control boat in a large tank. Only fate yet again would come Tesla’s way for now Westinghouse was being taken over and Mr. Westinghouse was not going to be able to pay Tesla, his Board of directors had told him to simply cut Tesla off. But being the dear friend he was to Tesla he went to talk with the man. Basically if Tesla had collect one the money he was contracted for he would have become the first billionaire in history but it would have also meant that the Westinghouse company would have failed and AC current would have died with it. And so Tesla tore up his contract and was once again penniless. In the 1890's he develop a form of wireless communication. “ When Guglielmo Marconi, who is often cited as the inventor of radio, publicly demonstrated signal transmission across the Atlantic in 1901 Tesla sarcastically remarked, “Let him continue. He is using seventeen of my patents (Nikola).” “In 1943, nearly six months after Tesla’s death, the Supreme Court declared Marconi’s patent invalid because the wireless technology it described was predated by the work of Sir Oliver Lodge, John Stone and Nikola Tesla.” Next he produced something called a Tesla coil which is a oscillation transformer with its primary and secondary coils tuned to resonance, which allowed currents of high voltage and high frequency to be produced. Which are now widely used in many college laboratories. He the...