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Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla was born on the night between July 9 and July 10, 1856 in the town of Smiljan in the Austrian Empire (now Croatia) to Milutin und Đuka Tesla.

 

Tesla is most popular for inventing the alternating current, which we are still using today.

 

In the 1880s, Tesla actually worked for Thomas Alva Edison, but soon thereafter, they became arch enemies.

Tesla was sent to Edison in New York by recommendation of Charles Batchelor in 1884, and was employed at Edison Machine Works. His work there ranged from simple electrical engineering to solving some of the company's biggest problems. One year later Tesla was offered $ 50,000 if he could re-design Edison's inefficient motors and generators to be more efficient and economical, which he did, but the money promised to him was never paid.

While Edison kept promoting his direct current (which would have required a power station every square mile - and would make Edison rich, obviously) Tesla was hired by George Westinghouse and together they lit the Chicago World's Fair (also known as: "World's Fair: Columbian Exposition") in 1892-1893 - with Tesla's alternating current.

Tesla also gave short-range demonstrations of radio communication two years before Guglielmo Marconi and experimented with x-rays three years before Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen.

For a Full list of Tesla patents see:

http://ia700403.us.archive.org/19/items/CompletePatentsOfNikolaTesla/Complete_Patents_Nikola_Tesla.pdf

Despite his many marvelous and important inventions not only for his time but also for ours, Tesla died poor in the Hotel New Yorker in 1943.

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