Nikola Tesla is
quite the cult figure, especially after the 90s with a lot of inventions being
attributed to his vision and experiments including wireless communication.
However, he is also the scientist who became rather obscure after his death in
the 1940s and even during his life; he was often described as the mad scientist. Best known for designing
the modern alternating current (AC) supply system, this is a short biography of
the scientist by Hourly History.
The book starts
with his birth in modern day Croatia, how he was very sharp in studies but
eventually dropping out of college because of his gambling addiction. It goes
to describe his working life with telephones at Budapest and job as a teaching
assistant in Prague before finally moving on to the United States. He initially
worked for Edison and later, with his game changing invention of a working
alternating current (AC) system for Westinghouse, became Edison’s direct
competitor. It talks about his legal disputes with Marconi over the invention
of radio. Tesla was debt-ridden and the book eventually ends with his death in
absolute penury and moving into obscurity.
The book brought
out the fact that Tesla was a visionary very well; that he imagined things and
he worked to create them, even things which were unimaginable in his time such
as wireless technology or alternating current. It also brought out how Tesla
didn’t care for money so long as he was given his space to conduct experiments
and invent things, such as how he tore up the royalty agreement with
Westinghouse when the company was in crisis.
The book was
slightly annoying in parts, wherein, no less than three times was it mentioned
that it we must all be thankful to Tesla for the radio, the smartphone we are
holding, the tablet we’re using, etc. While the need to acknowledge his
contribution is fine, I don’t think it is logical to expect people to thank
Alexander Graham Bell when they dial a number, John Logie Baird when they
switch on the television, etc. Similar to my point on Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s
biography by Hourly History, Tesla too was an engineer and some diagrams and
illustrations would have helped (such as the Tesla coil).
Tesla did
achieve a lot of things, but certainly not as what the cult projects, as being
the inventor of practically everything and I might have appreciated the book
more had they dedicated a small paragraph in the conclusion debunking those
myths (such as Tesla inventing radar technology).
I would award
the book a rating of six on ten.
Rating
– 6/10
Have
a nice day,
Andy
Andy
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