Nikola Tesla (July 10, 1856 - January 7, 1943) - was an inventor in the field of electrical and radio engineering, engineer, physicist. He gained worldwide fame for his contribution to the creation of alternating current devices, polyphase systems and the electric motor, which made it possible to make the so-called second stage of the industrial revolution. He is also known as a supporter of the existence of ether: it is known about his numerous experiments and experiments aimed at showing the presence of ether as a special form of matter, amenable to use in technology. The unit for measuring magnetic flux density (magnetic induction) was named after Tesla. Contemporaries - biographers believed that Tesla was "the man who invented the 20th century" and the "patron saint" of modern electricity.
Tesla was born and raised in Austria-Hungary, his family lived in the village of Smilyan, six kilometers from the city of Gospic, the main city of the historical province of Lika. Father - Milutin Tesla - was a priest of the Sremsk diocese of the Serbian Orthodox Church, mother - Georgina Mandic, was the daughter of a priest.
Nikola graduated from the 1st grade of elementary school in Smiliany. 1862 - his father received a promotion, and the Tesla family moved to Gospic, where he finished the remaining three classes of elementary school, and then the 3-year lower real school, which he graduated from in 1870. In the same year, in the fall, Nikola entered to the Higher Real School in the city of Karlovac. He lived in the house of his aunt, father's cousin, Stanka Baranovich.
1873 July - Tesla receives a certificate of maturity. Having disobeyed his father's order, Nikola returned to his family in Gospic, where an epidemic of cholera was raging, and immediately fell ill (although it is not known for certain whether it was actually cholera). Here is what Nicola himself said about it:
“Since childhood, the path of a priest was destined for me. A perspective like a black cloud hung over me. After receiving my matriculation certificate, I made the decision to pursue spiritual studies. It was at that time that a terrible cholera epidemic broke out, decimating a tenth of the population. The disease knocked me down too. Cholera later led to dropsy, lung problems, and other illnesses. 9 months in bed, almost motionless, seemed to drain all my vitality, and the doctors abandoned me.
It was an excruciating experience not so much because of physical suffering, but because of my great desire to live. During one of the attacks, when everyone thought that I was going to die, my father rushed into the room to support me with these words: "You will get well." As I now see his deathly pale face when he tried to cheer me up in a tone that contradicted his assurances. “Perhaps,” I replied, “I will be able to recover if you allow me to become not a priest, but an engineer and allow me to go to study engineering.”
“You will enter the best educational institution in Europe,” he said solemnly, and I knew that he would do it. A heavy burden fell from my soul. But consolation would have come very late if I had not been incredibly cured by an old woman with a decoction of beans. There was no power of suggestion or mysterious influence in this. The remedy for the disease was in the full sense curative, heroic, if not desperate, but it had an effect."
Tesla, who recovered, entered the Higher Technical School in Graz (now the Graz Technical University), where he began to study electrical engineering. Observing the operation of the Gramm machine at lectures on electrical engineering, Nikola comes to the idea of the imperfection of DC machines, but Professor Jacob Peschl sharply criticized his ideas, giving a lecture on the impossibility of using alternating current in electric motors before the whole course.
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After graduating from college, Nikola Tesla gets a job as a teacher in a real gymnasium in Gospic - the one in which he studied. Working in Gospic did not suit him. The family did not have enough money, and only thanks to the financial support of his two uncles, Petar and Pavel Mandic, Nikola was able to go to Prague in January 1880, where he entered the philosophy department of the Prague University. In order to somehow survive, young Tesla tripled for a part-time job - until 1882 he worked as an electrical engineer in the Budapest government telegraph company. However, this work did not give Tesla the opportunity to carry out his plans to create an alternating current electric motor. As soon as the opportunity arose, he got a job at the Parisian Continental Company of Edison, but there he was deceived without paying the promised fee, as a result of which he, insulted, resigned.
One of the first biographers of Tesla, Boris Rzhonsnitsky, said: “At that time, Tesla had amazing inventions in his luggage that were important for the development of electrical engineering. He wanted to sell them at his place of work, but after cheating with money, he decided to sell them to someone else. His first thought was to go to St. Petersburg, since many important discoveries were made in Russia at that time, the names of Pavel Yablochkov, Dmitry Lachinov, Vladimir Chikolev and others were well known to electricians all over the world. However, at the last moment, one of his friends persuaded him to go to America instead of Russia.
1884 Tesla arrives in New York and takes a job as a repair engineer for electric motors and DC generators. He once offered his boss a bet: he would be paid $ 50,000 (about the equivalent of $ 1 million at the time) if he could constructively improve Edison's DC electric machines. The bet was concluded, Tesla actively set to work and soon introduced 24 variants of the Edison machine, a new switch and regulator, which significantly improve performance. Having approved all the improvements, in response to a question about money, Edison refused Tesla, noting that the emigrant did not yet understand American humor very well.
For several years, Nikola was forced to interrupt in ancillary work. He dug ditches, "slept where he had to, and ate what he found." During this period, he became friends with a similarly positioned engineer Brown, who managed to persuade several of his acquaintances to provide a small financial support to the inventor. 1887, April - The Tesla Arc company created with this money began to arrange street lighting with new arc lamps. Soon the prospects of the company were confirmed by large orders from many American cities, and the first million appeared on its bank account.
For the company's office in New York, the inventor rented a house on Fifth Avenue near the building occupied by the Edison company. Between their companies, a sharp competition began, known in the United States as the "War of currents".
1888, July - the famous American industrialist George Westinghouse bought more than 40 patents from Nikola Tesla, paying an average of $ 25,000 for each. He also invited Nicola to be a consultant at factories in Pittsburgh, where industrial designs of AC machines were being developed. The work did not bring satisfaction to Tesla, slowing down the emergence of new ideas. Despite the industrialist's persuasion, the inventor returned to his laboratory in New York a year later.
In subsequent years, Nikola Tesla was engaged in the study of magnetic fields and high frequencies in his laboratory. This period was the most fruitful: he received many patents - their number exceeded one hundred thousand (various electrical appliances, frequency meters, devices for equipping submarines, various radio equipment, a number of improvements in steam turbines, etc.). All the money that he earned he spent on his experiments, which glorified him for centuries. In his speeches, the inventor said that he gets the ideas of inventions from the single information field of the Earth, to which he learned to “connect”.
Nikola Tesla's inventions
Summer 1914 - Serbia was at the center of the events that led to the outbreak of the First World War. While staying in the United States, Nikola Tesla thought about creating a superweapon for the first time: "I am obliged to create a machine that can destroy one or more armies in one action."
• Such a weapon, as is commonly believed, was never invented by Tesla. Although, this is only the official version. Many of the researchers believe that the Tunguska meteorite, which fell in Siberia more than a hundred years ago, is nothing more than a test of Nikola Tesla's new unique weapon. In support of this hypothesis, it is known that many of the researcher who visited the laboratory saw a map of Siberia on his wall, including the area in which the explosion occurred. In addition, in one of the articles - which was published several months before the explosion on Tunguska, Tesla himself wrote: "… Even now my wireless power plants are capable of turning any area of the world into an area uninhabitable …".
There is more evidence. So, a few months before the explosion, the scientist publicly announced that he intends to illuminate the road to the north pole of the expedition of the famous traveler Robert Peary with electricity. It should be noted that on the night of June 30, many observers in Canada and Northern Europe observed clouds of an unusual silvery color in the sky that seemed to be pulsing. This is consistent with eyewitness reports who previously observed Tesla's experiments in his laboratory. In addition, at that time, in dozens of settlements in Western Europe and Russia, an intense glow of the sky, night glowing clouds and unusually colorful twilight were observed. According to spectral observations, which were carried out in Germany and England, the glow was not related to the aurora.
• A little later, in 1914, a scientist proposed a project according to which the entire globe, together with the atmosphere, was to become a giant lamp. To do this, it is only necessary to pass a high-frequency current through the upper layers of the atmosphere, and they will begin to glow. But the inventor did not explain how to do this, although he has repeatedly assured that he does not see any difficulties in this.
This was his main invention - "Worldwide wireless system of information and energy transmission." The transmitting station would be able to direct electricity anywhere in the world, taking into account the reflection from the ionosphere - the upper layers of the atmosphere and from the Earth itself. Everyone could use it - ships, planes, factories through a special receiving installation. The same system could, according to the inventor's assurances, broadcast accurate time signals, music, drawings, facsimile texts to the whole world.
All these facts, no doubt, strengthen the position of supporters of the hypothesis, which states that on June 30, 1908, no meteorite or comet fell in the area of the Podkamennaya Tunguska River in Siberia, and the explosion was a consequence of Nikola Tesla's experiment with the transfer of energy over long distances.
• Another mysterious invention of Tesla, about which his followers have been controversial for a long time - the "Earthquake Machine", which worked on electromagnetic waves, it is assumed that could cause natural disasters anywhere in the world. According to legend, it was this machine that caused the 1908 earthquake in New York, which destroyed the scientist's laboratory. Tesla destroyed this car himself, because he saw the real danger it poses to people.
In general, the inventor did not patent many of his discoveries and did not even leave drawings. Most of his diaries and manuscripts have not survived, and only fragmentary information about many inventions has survived to this day. For example, according to some reports, Nikola Tesla invented a super-frequency radio receiver that helps to receive signals from other planets.
• He managed to establish a connection with living entities on some distant planet (he suggested that it is possible Mars, but was not sure about it).
• 1931 - Nicola showed the public a strange car. They pulled out a gasoline engine from a luxury limousine and installed an electric motor. Then Tesla, in front of the public, placed a nondescript box under the hood, from which two rods were sticking out, and connected it to the engine. Saying, "Now we have energy," the inventor got behind the wheel and drove off. The car was tested for a week. She developed a speed of up to 150 km / h and, as it was seen, did not need to be recharged at all. To the questions: "Where does the energy come from?" He replied: "From the air." After a successful test, the car and all its blueprints were destroyed - articles appeared in the newspapers of those times, where they put forward two versions of this act: either the inventor went crazy, or he was threatened by large automotive businessmen, who realized that the electric car would completely destroy their business.
• Another scientist announced to the world that he had invented "death rays" capable of destroying any flying aircraft at a distance of up to 400 km by pressing a button on the control panel.
• He invented a camera that could photograph the human biofield (aura).
The death of the inventor is also associated with mysticism. In old age, Tesla was hit by a car, he received a fractured ribs. The disease caused acute pneumonia, which turned into a chronic form. The scientist was bedridden, and soon died - from heart failure. Nevertheless, many newspapers then wrote that Tesla's death could have been faked by those to whom he crossed the path with his inventions, or those who could be offended by the scientist's refusal to cooperate.
Tesla's body was not found immediately, only two days after his death a maid looked into the room from which he did not leave. On January 12, the body was cremated, and an urn with ashes was installed at Fairncliff Cemetery in New York. Later it was transferred to the Nikola Tesla Museum in Belgrade.