Chase Watkins Mr. Ausman MWH-2 1/13/16 Nikola Tesla Not many recognize the name today, and even to those who do, the words Nikola Tesla are likely to conjure up the image of a crazy, not an actual scientist. Nikola Tesla was one of the greatest inventors ever. “Tesla was born in 1856 in Smiljan, Croatia”(History.com Staff 1)Tesla studied math and physics at the Technical University of Graz. Shortly after he was employed in a government telegraph engineering office in Budapest, where he came up with his first invention the alternating current motor. In 1884 Tesla arrived the United States with 4 cents and the clothes on his back, the rest is history., Nikola Tesla invented the alternating-current electrical system that's used everywhere …show more content…
Tesla left a vast and certainly storied legacy as an inventor and a man. When tesla arrived in America he got in touch with already famed inventor Thomas Edison. Eventually Edison employed him at his electrical company. When word got out of tesla's alternating current motor, it was essentially a “war of currents”. Edison had created the direct current motor and thought it was superior to tesla's alternating current motor. Tesla proposed free energy for all, while Edison did not like the idea because of the money it would cause him to lose. Eventually the two made a bet, Tesla would work on Edison's DC motor and improve it, the reward was $50,000 dollars. Tesla followed through and made great improvements to the DC motor. He went to meet with Edison to get the money, Edison promptly denied him and made a joke saying, “Tesla, you …show more content…
This was because he was a man of such integrity and he was never in it for the money. Later in his life he unveiled the plan of worldwide electricity for free, that anyone could use. The likes of corporate greed such as J.P. Morgan and Thomas Edison spread propaganda around the country of how Tesla's electricity would hurt people, and was unsafe. What was unsafe was that Tesla might have unlocked the key to free energy. After J.P. Morgan pulled the money that he had invested in Tesla, Tesla went downhill fast. He eventually declared bankruptcy in 1917. Tesla eventually return to work as a consultant, and spent his latter days feeding and talking to the pigeons in New York City. The thing that separates Tesla from all the other inventors is that he was never in it for the money. He created things people couldn't even fathom, and yet he didn't trick them for his benefit financially. He dealt with many facets of the industrial revolution from AC currents, induction motors, and radio frequencies. Poor and minuscule , Nikola Tesla died on January 7, 1943, at the age of 86, in New York, where he had lived for almost 60 years. However the legacy of the work he left behind him lives on to this day in AC motors, energy, and the futuristic Tesla