MEXICO CITY (process.com.mx).–On July 10, 1856, Nikola Tesla was born, one of the most emblematic characters in science, particularly with regard to electricity and its consequences on modern life. The life of this character seems incredible for many reasons, but perhaps the fact that Elon Musk decided to name his electric car company, Tesla, people began to find out who this engineer-inventor, promoter of alternating current and almost an enemy of Thomas Alba Edison, who, as we will see, played dirty with him more than once.
But what are Nikola Tesla’s contributions? Why is it finally so important? These questions encouraged me to research this character and I ended up writing a short biography about him. I wrote this little work when the pandemic didn’t let us leave the house. Here is the prologue of it:
Almost eighty years after the death of Nikola Tesla, the man has become a true “rock star” of science, thanks to the Internet and social networks. The Serbian inventor has undoubtedly had such an influence on the modern world that without his creations, we would be far from having the world we have. However, for some reason, the Tesla name has been forgotten for, perhaps, too many years.
Who was Nikola Tesla and what did he do in his life as an inventor? ¿Why is it so important? Those are the two questions that animate this work. Curiosity led me to read about this character, his early life, his education, his entry into the working world and shortly after, his trip to the United States where he really made his life. . It is clear that Tesla was unique in his class and his inventive capacity, in addition to the intellectual, led him to develop a series of notable inventions, where two probably stand out: the induction motor and the “Tesla coil”, which were a true revolution in technology. Thanks to Nikola Tesla, without going any further, we enjoy the electric current that reaches our homes. Without his determination and stubbornness, the advances we are experiencing would perhaps not exist.
Nikola Tesla was the promoter of alternating current, which would be the winner in the battle against direct current, promoted by Thomas Alba Edison, who despite his success and fame, could not face the certainty of the Serbian inventor’s ideas. who managed to overcome countless setbacks and unfair practices on the part of Edison, among many many vicissitudes. The battle of electric currents, as it was known in its time, proved that alternating current was the option to electrify cities. Tesla won and Edison lost.
Tesla’s life was that of a scientist who loved his work. Anyone, with the number of patents that the inventor generated, would have been able to live comfortably the rest of their days. But Tesla was insatiable for ideas to take advantage of electricity, and perhaps that’s why he was always broke. Money that came to him was invested in his laboratory, where ideas and experiments came from that seemed to be far ahead of his time.
But he was also a human being who had a series of unorthodox customs and had also acquired a series of phobias that made him a peculiar character. He lived his last twenty years in hotels and, furthermore, he was scrupulous to the extreme in his way of dressing, always elegant, always perfectly neat. He always ate at the same times and followed a series of rituals that more than one could classify him as a sick person. He claimed that he had never slept more than three hours a day, because he simply didn’t need it. A lover of pigeons, he fed them in the window of his hotel room and even had one that was his favorite and that he confessed that he loved like a man loves a woman.
But time passed and Tesla grew old. He was very recognized in his time but he, tireless, wanted to continue working tirelessly. His mind began to wear out. Even so, he was a promoter of world peace and in addition, he came up with a destructive ray, using electrical energy, which he said would be a “ray of peace”, because all countries could have it and in that way avoid wars.
His final years ended in poverty, dying in a hotel room in early 1943. But this was perhaps the catalyst for the United States government to decide to confiscate his belongings, papers, inventions, everything, for fear that a country enemy would get hold of that eventual powerful weapon or any other of his inventions. World War II was underway and the world was in turmoil. They were very difficult times.
Nikola Tesla has become a reference in science. He made notable contributions, starting with the use of alternating current to discovering X-rays before Röntgen. He had the idea of a flying machine and proposed a bladeless turbine and a radar, which he had designed for the First Great War. Multifaceted inventor who also left evidence with an enormous number of patents and writings, both about his life and the inventions that he designed throughout the years in which he lived.
It should be noted that some small chapters have been interspersed in the work with explanations of the physical phenomena that animated his inventions, as well as a simple description of some of the most popular and important ones. This gives context and in some way enlightens those who come into contact with the subject of electricity for the first time.
This book therefore seeks to do justice to Nikola Tesla, a great engineer, an outstanding inventor, without whom modern life would be inconceivable. Let this work be like a tribute to his work.
Manuel Lopez Michelone
Mexico City.
April 2020
This is the index of the book:
The first years of life 05
Static electricity 08
Tesla Education 11
The Gramme 12 dynamo
Your entry into the world of work 13
Induction motor 16
Tesla in the United States 19
Direct current versus alternating current 21
Charting your own path 23
Tesla’s egg 27
The war of electric currents 29
The Tesla Oscillator 35
Marconi and the invention of radio 37
At the Tesla coil 42
The fire of 1895 45
The bladeless turbine 47
The following inventions 49
Colorado Springs y Wardenclyffe 54
The death ray 60
The strange life of an inventor 64
The death of Nikola Tesla 68
Tesla and the Nobel Prize 71
Wanting to change the climate 73
¿Tesla contra Einstein? 75
X-rays before Röntgen? 77
Communication with Martians? 80
In search of free energy 82
Tesla, a “rockstar” 83
Timeline of the life of Tesla 88
Bibliography 90
Notes 92
This time I put the book in the “pay what you want or what you can” mode. Thus, the potential reader can read, copy, and share the book with their friends and family. If you think it is worth it and want to support, you can deposit your donations into my PayPal account (morsa@la-morsa.com). In any case, I appreciate the interest. This is the link to it:
