Tesla: Master of Lightning Page #2

in the ground.

Tesla perceived a

whirling field of energy.

He suddenly knew he could

recreate this rotating field

by powering the coils of a

motor in different steps or phases

like the pistons of an engine.

The resulting forces of magnetic

attraction and repulsion

would literally twist

the rotor in a circle,

the electrical equivalent of the wheel.

And all this was accomplished

with alternating currents.

It would soon turn the wheels

of industry around the world.

The strength of Tesla's mind

was almost certainly in his

sense of visualization,

to be able to see things

move in front of him.

You see, It was not a

perpetual-motion scheme.

It had been the height of my ambition

and my most ardent wish

to see America

and come in contact with

the great Thomas Edison.

Accordingly, I undertook the voyage

and, after losing my money and tickets,

and passing through a series of mishaps,

including a mutiny in which

I almost lost my life,

I landed on these blessed shores

with four cents in my pocket.

Tesla arrived in New York

on June 6th, 1884.

A 28-year-old immigrant,

he was filled with dreams of

success in this strange new land.

In his pocket he carried a letter of

recommendation from Charles Batchelor,

one of Edison's associates in Europe.

My dear Edison,

I know two great men

and you are one of them.

The other is this young man.

Tesla came to America

because he had tried

to get his alternating current

motor produced in Germany

and, I believe, in France

as well, without any success.

And he realized that there was

probably only one person in the world

who could help him with it

and that was Thomas Edison.

New York had had electricity

since the late 1870s.

Edison installed his first DC

power station on Pearl Street

near the financial district in 1882.

He did this with help from the great

Wall Street financier J. Pierpont Morgan.

But the system was far from perfect.

Electricity was a very new thing;

most people didn't understand

what it was all about.

They were very afraid of it.

There were fires breaking out.

The horses on the streets

would get shocks through

their shoes and run away.

So it was a very exciting

time for Edison.

I was thrilled to the marrow

meeting Edison.

This great man had revolutionized

the world with his incandescent lamp.

And I was burning to show him

my motor

that ran on alternating currents.

Edison had built his business

on the direct current system

and any talk of alternating

currents was an aggravation to him.

The problem with direct current is

that you can't change the voltage.

What you'd generate,

that's what you'd get.

And if you generated the

power at too high a voltage,

you would blow out lamps

at the other end.

If you generate at the

proper power for the lamps

and you want to go any

great distance,

then you need copper wire

that's as thick as your arm.

and the Edison people said:

Well, that's all right,

well just have a power

station every mile or so.

DC was sufficient to power

lights and run motors

but it could not be transmitted

efficiently over long distances.

By raising and lowering the voltage

AC could solve the

problem of distance

but a working AC motor

did not exist.

In spite of their differences

Edison hired Tesla to improve the

performance of his DC generators.

Tesla said he was promised

$50,000 if he was successful.

The offer seemed too good

to be true.

I entered the Edison Machine Works

where I undertook the design

of DC dynamos and motors.

My regular hours were from

10:
30 am till 5:00 am the next day.

When I completed the task

I went to Edison for payment

and he laughed.

Edison was very amused by this

and said:
You just don't understand

our American sense of humor, Mr. Tesla.

So Tesla had had enough

by that time

and he picked up his hat

and walked out.

Tesla paid dearly for his pride.

I lived through a year of

bitter tears and hard labor

digging ditches for

Edison's underground cables.

But he was still determined

to develop his AC motor.

With help from a group of investors

he opened a laboratory on Liberty Street

only a few blocks from the Edison's offices.

There he began to assemble a

prototype of the motor he had

envisioned seven years earlier.

Along with it he developed

all the components of

the system of AC power generation

and transmission still used today.

In May of 1888, Tesla was ready

to unveil his motor to the world.

The subject which I now have the

pleasure of bringing to your notice

is a novel motor which I

am confident will at once

establish the superior

adaptability of alternating currents.

Over the next five years 22 U.S.

patents were awarded to Nikola Tesla

for AC motors, generators,

transformers and transmission lines

the most valuable patents since

the invention of the telephone.

One of the few men who understood

the great potential of Tesla's inventions

was the Pittsburgh industrialist

George Westinghouse.

He visited Tesla's laboratory and,

on the spot,

he offered to purchase

all the patents dealing

with the alternating current system

for one million dollars.

Westinghouse also proposed

a royalty of $2.50

for each horsepower

generated by a Tesla invention.

The young Serb was on his

way to fortune and fame

while other inventors looked on

with fascination and with envy.

In all my troubles

I did not neglect to become

a real American citizen

making me a proud and happy man.

During the late 1880s Edison began

a negative media campaign

to discredit the alternating

current system of electricity

being developed by

Westinghouse and Tesla.

It became known as

The War of the Currents.

My personal desire would be to prohibit

entirely the use of alternating currents.

They are as unnecessary as

they are dangerous.

Edison employees demonstrated

the dangers of alternating current

by electrocuting animals

in public demonstrations.

Just as certain as death

Westinghouse will kill a customer

within six months after

he puts in a system of any size.

None of his plans worry me

in the least.

An Edison associate suggested

using alternating current

as a means of executing criminals.

A test took place at New York's

Auburn State Prison in 1890.

Several gruesome attempts

were required to kill the victim.

Disgusted witnesses claimed

his spinal cord burst into flame.

The infliction of the death penalty

is not only barbarous and inhuman

but unnecessary as a factor in

the scheme of modern civilization.

The war of the currents came

to a dramatic head in 1893.

The Columbian Exposition in Chicago

was to be the first World's

Fair lighted by electricity.

The Edison Company, the

Thomson-Houston Company,

they all got together and formed

General Electric Company 1892.

One of the first things they

did of course was put in the

bid for the job at the Fair.

Their bid was roughly

a million dollars.

The Westinghouse bid was about

half a million dollars, and naturally

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes