Probably everyone has heard about who Nikola Tesla is. The name of the scientist, inventor and "master of electricity" during his lifetime was overgrown with various rumors and details. And there were reasons for that. Tesla lived in solitude, did not communicate with women, preferred pigeons to people and spent most of his time in laboratories. Nicola was considered a clairvoyant, time traveler, and even an alien from the future.
The scientist's success story still inspires many people around the world. We have studied the biography of Nikola Tesla and are sure that there will be enough stories from his life for a whole adventure series with elements of mysticism.
In the west of Croatia, at the foot of the Velebit Mountains, there is the village of Smilyan. It was there that Nikola Tesla was born in the family of the Orthodox priest Milutin Tesla in 1856. Fans of everything otherworldly and paranormal claim that on the night of Nikola's birth there was a full moon. And it was the moon that predetermined his future life. It was rumored that from an early age Nikola had the gift of clairvoyance. But this is just talk.
Nikola grew up as a kind, open and inquisitive child. He read a lot and immediately remembered everything he read. The happy childhood ended at the moment when the eldest son of the Tesla family Dane died. According to one of the legends, upon learning of his brother's death, Nikola fled to the mountains and spent the night in a crypt on someone's grave.
Nikola studied at the technical school in Karlovac. Contrary to the wishes of his father, after graduating from college, he returned to his homeland, where a cholera epidemic was raging. Nikola fell ill. The disease proceeded with terrible complications: Tesla developed dropsy and pulmonary edema.
Tesla continued his studies at the Austrian Polytechnic. Studying was easy for him, but instead of a riotous student life, Nikola disappeared at lectures. He often argued with teachers and criticized their ideas. Polytechnic professors warned that if Tesla did not expel from the educational institution, he would soon die of overwork.
But Nicola did not die of overwork. He was captured by a new passion - gambling. Tesla was losing huge sums of money at cards. In the end, he lost so much that his family went into debt.
Nikola Tesla while studying at the Polytechnic.
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Nicola got bored with studying. He did not come to the session and he was expelled from the polytechnic. Telling parents and friends that he, a great genius and inventor, was expelled as some kind of poor student was like death. And he did not find anything better … than to stage his own death. For a long time, Tesla's entourage thought that he had drowned in the Mura River. In fact, Nicola went into vagrancy. The second time he returned home under police protection - he did not have a residence permit.
Financial difficulties forced him to drop out of studies at the University of Prague, and Nikola was forced to look for work. He moved to Budapest. He worked in a telephone exchange, pulled wires, was a draftsman and electrician, and tried to create an AC motor.
Combining work and great scientific achievements proved to be a difficult task. After weighing all the pros and cons, drawing the last drawing, Tesla asked for a calculation and left Budapest. Yes, not just anywhere, but to Paris. There he quickly got a job in the office of Thomas Edison himself - the father of the light bulb. He helped build the power plant.
When the construction was completed and Nikola returned to Paris, it turned out that he was paid nothing at all for the work. Tesla's pride was hurt. And the scientist quit.
Nikola Tesla is holding a gas-filled fluorescent lamp with wireless coverage.
In 1884, Tesla set foot on American soil. He decided to try his luck once again and again got a job with Thomas Edison. The story with payment repeated itself again.
Edison did not approve of Tesla's innovative ideas, but promised the young scientist $ 50,000 if he could improve DC electric machines. Nikola actively got down to work and a month later brought 24 drawings. Edison approved the drawings, but Tesla refused to pay, saying that the immigrant did not understand American humor well. Nicola resigned immediately.
Tesla again went in search of work. He was no stranger to hard work, and Tesla went to dig ditches. He slept in the same place, interrupted himself from bread to water, until he met the engineer Brown. Brown realized that Tesla's inventions were a gold mine, and quickly found the means to organize a physics laboratory.
Nicola figured out how to electrify streets efficiently and inexpensively. Orders came from all over the United States. To anger Thomas Edison, Tesla rented a huge new office opposite his office. The goal was achieved - Edison was furious.
Tesla worked actively on his inventions. He developed a model of an asynchronous induction motor, transformer, antenna, described the essence of the rotation of the magnetic field and the principle of radio communication, discovered a way to clean contaminated surfaces using current and treat acne with electricity. Tesla even wrote the first safety rules for working with electricity.
But Nikola had something that could scare the people of the United States - an earthquake machine. In fact, it was a device for studying electromagnetic waves. When Tesla launched the device, there was a low rumble in the streets, glass rattled and walls shook. Soon the earthquake spread throughout the city, people ran out of their houses in panic.
Tesla's neighbors were sure that this was the trick of the inventor, and called the police. As soon as the police knocked on the door, the earthquake stopped. Nikola admitted: yes, it was he who arranged the earthquake. And it won't be like that anymore.
In 1895, a fire broke out in the laboratory. The building burned down to the ground. The flames destroyed all blueprints and latest inventions. Tesla was not taken aback and restored documents and devices from memory. He soon moved to a new laboratory, where he studied electromagnetic radiation and grew fireballs.
When a huge tower with a copper ball at the top appeared in the suburbs of New York, Tesla gained the image of a crazy genius. What was not said about this tower: that it pumps out electricity from the core of the Earth, that Nikola wants to de-energize New York and even contacts aliens. But everything turned out to be much simpler.
With the help of the tower, Tesla planned to transmit energy at a distance. The moment the tower went live, something happened that shocked the New Yorkers. The night sky was lit up with bright flashes of light, it became as bright as day, and the northern lights appeared in the sky.
An urban legend says that the launch of the tower coincided with the fall of the Tunguska meteorite. Someone even claims that Tesla "pulled" the meteorite. And others - that there really was no meteorite, but there was a charge of energy that Tesla transferred from his laboratory.
Soon, funding for Tesla's experiments ended and the tower had to be closed. It was demolished in 1917.
The First World War began. Nikola supported the Serbian army financially. He thought about inventing a superweapon that could destroy multiple armies in one action. Conspiracy theorists said the scientist succeeded. But, fearing the consequences, Nikola classified all the drawings.
The US Department of Defense still tried to recreate Tesla's superweapon. But due to budget overruns and poor results, the project was closed.
There is a story that in 1931 Tesla showed the world the first electric car. He removed the internal combustion engine from a conventional car and installed his own - a DC motor. The electric car has developed an incredible speed of up to 150 km / h. The scientist traveled around New York for a week, and the witnesses to the experiment could not understand how it all works. When a barrage of criticism fell on Tesla, he simply dismantled the motor and destroyed it.
In the last years of his life, Nikola continued to conjure over electricity. The scientist's life was cut short at 87 in a hotel room. Thrombosis became the cause of death. The urn with the ashes of Nikola Tesla is kept in his museum in Belgrade.
Tesla's monuments are installed near the building of the Belgrade University, Belgrade International Airport (Serbia), the Church of the Resurrection of Christ in Podgorica (Montenegro), in New York (USA), Niagara Falls (USA), Prague (Czech Republic), Cheboksary (Russia), Baku (Azerbaijan). But the most unusual one is in Silicon Valley - it hands out Wi-Fi.
Several musical groups are named after Tesla, his image appears in many films. One of the most striking and memorable incarnations of Tesla's image on the screen was the role of David Bowie in the film "The Prestige". According to the plot, Nikola Tesla invents a teleportation machine, with the help of which the main character shows unprecedented tricks. And in the middle
Tesla's scientific heritage remains largely unexplored. The Belgrade Museum contains over 60 thousand documents that have not yet been examined.
Alternating current, which Tesla studied all his life, is now used to transmit electricity over long distances. It is he who owns the development of remote radio control, transmission of energy over a distance, a locator. Also, the scientist was engaged in aircraft construction and even received a patent for an aircraft that can take off vertically. In total, Nicola received about 300 patents.
The electric motor developed by the scientist is used in modern electric trains, electric cars, trams, and trolleybuses. Tesla's generators are used by most hydroelectric power plants, nuclear power plants, thermal power plants, etc. Wireless chargers are starting to be used to charge mobile phones and laptops. And electricity meters are used in every home.
What would the world be like without Nikola Tesla's inventions? Share your opinion in the comments.
