Tesla obtained some three hundred patents and provided our modern economy with electric motors, robots, remote controls, and radio.
When wanting money, Tesla resorted to flattery.
Oddly enough, yes. After Tesla died, the FBI was concerned that he had developed and crafted designs for a death beam that could wipe out armies and aircraft – something in 1942 American authorities did not really want to fall into the hands of our adversaries.
No doubt Tesla was naturally bright – he learned eight languages and could recite lengthy poems and stories.
What Tesla did develop was a spherical carbon button that glowed when placed at the end of a wire connected to one terminal of his oscillating transformer or coil.
No doubt Tesla demonstrated some odd habits.
While he gambled and played billiards, Tesla also took up several habits, including becoming an obsessive smoker, burning fifteen or twenty big black cigars every day.
No, but he did envision a “world system” or wireless communications that would send telephone messages, music, stock market reports, pictures, and even secure messages to any part of the planet.
No. When he was 24, however, he fell in love with Anna (we only know her first name), whom he described as being “tall and beautiful with extraordinary understandable eyes.”
Tesla could be a strict boss, issuing directives that “All work must be done first class. Tell the other workmen not to lose sight of this.”
No. The army expected young men in its territories to serve for three years.
Milutin wanted his surviving son to be a priest, fearing that his fragile health would not survive the military or what he assumed were the rigors of intensive engineering study.
Djuka descended from a distinguished family of priests and inventors.
Milutin Tesla was an Orthodox priest, serving some eighty families in the province of Lika, which is a part of Croatia.
The Tesla name, in Serbian, has two somewhat related meanings.
Tesla slept only a few hours each night.
When he had money and dined at Delmonico’s or the Palm Room, he enjoyed thick steak, preferably filet mignon.
No, but he thought he had.