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Speaker 1: Welcome to tex Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios.

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Speaker 1: How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff.

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Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with

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Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and I love all things tech and

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Speaker 1: um looking at the calendar, it looks like it's a Friday.

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Speaker 1: That means it's time for another classic episode of tech Stuff.

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Speaker 1: This episode we're about to listen to originally published back

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Speaker 1: in February two thirteen, and it's all about Nicola Tesla.

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Speaker 1: And I'm sure you guys are at least familiar with

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Speaker 1: the name. Tesla has been the featured player in many

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Speaker 1: an Internet meme over the past several years, and there

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Speaker 1: are a lot of stories about him. Some of them

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Speaker 1: are true, and some of them are probably exaggerated, and

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Speaker 1: some of them might just be completely off basse. So

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Speaker 1: I wanted to develop a full episode about Tesla and

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Speaker 1: talk about him his good points, is bad points, everything

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Speaker 1: in between, and that's what we're going to listen to.

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Speaker 1: So let's sit back and hear this classic episode of

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Speaker 1: tech Stuff. We are focusing finally, after many, many, many

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Speaker 1: people have asked us to do a full episode about

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Speaker 1: Nicola Tesla. The Internet legend the the man placed on

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Speaker 1: a virtual pedestal on the Internet that is gleaming and

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Speaker 1: beauteous and will zap you if you ever dare say

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Speaker 1: anything against him. He is, he's staring at us from

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Speaker 1: the walls of the podcast room right now. Yes, he is. Now.

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Speaker 1: The question of whether or not he'll be staring at

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Speaker 1: us in our news studio it remains to be answered. Uh,

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Speaker 1: we'll probably end up propping him up on a mic

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Speaker 1: stand or something, so he's still judging us constantly. But yeah,

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Speaker 1: we want to talk about Tesla, kind of talk about

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Speaker 1: his his contributions to technology and also maybe take a

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Speaker 1: critical look at some of the some of the claims

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Speaker 1: about slaw and some of the misconceptions people have about

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Speaker 1: his contributions. Yeah, he's he's a mythological figure, really a

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Speaker 1: mythological nerd figure, which is which is fabulous. I mean,

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Speaker 1: it's really terrific, and it's it's it's understandable why because

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Speaker 1: he he by the end of his life, was so downtrodden.

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Speaker 1: And there's nothing that people and geeks especially love more

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Speaker 1: than than an anti hero. Yeah. Here, here's a guy

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Speaker 1: who has been beaten down. He's he's Uh, seen his

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Speaker 1: fortunes dwindle away. He's he's made some bad choices. Uh.

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Speaker 1: He has all the earmarks of a classic geek. Geeks

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Speaker 1: love this underdog kind of story. And when you get

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Speaker 1: into things like sort of the the demonification of other people,

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Speaker 1: Edison in particular, Yeah, but even people like JP Morgan

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Speaker 1: and Lustinghouse, then it seems like the whole world had

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Speaker 1: turned against him. And and depending on how you look

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Speaker 1: at his story, it can definitely come across that way.

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Speaker 1: But that's doing a little bit of a disservice to

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Speaker 1: the entire tale. And Uh, the reason why I'm talking

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Speaker 1: about in this way is because there is what we

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Speaker 1: thought some people referred to as the cult of Tesla, right,

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Speaker 1: this idea of elevating him beyond what his contributions were. Uh,

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Speaker 1: there was a cartoon that I think a lot of

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Speaker 1: you guys out there saw because he posted about it

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Speaker 1: on our Facebook page that the Oatmeal did all about

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Speaker 1: Tesla and his contributions and his rivalry with Edison and

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Speaker 1: kind of comparing him favorably against Edison in every single

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Speaker 1: category and saying that there should be a Tesla museum.

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Speaker 1: And so we wanted to talk about what Tesla actually

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Speaker 1: did and what he did not do, and uh, and

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Speaker 1: whether or not he deserves all those acohomis yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And and and just just before anyone who is a rabbit

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Speaker 1: fan of the oat mal gets honest, because I don't

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Speaker 1: I do not want to incite your anger. Uh, it's

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Speaker 1: we realize that it's a comic and that that although uh,

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Speaker 1: many of the statements are factual, the writer whose name

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Speaker 1: I'm completely forgetting right now has come out and said that, hey,

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Speaker 1: this is a comic. I'm I'm a comic artist. And

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Speaker 1: some of this was hyper Bowl so perfectly. No, I

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Speaker 1: like its hyper Bowl. It's way better than that Super One.

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Speaker 1: I like the hyper Bowl a lot more. I am

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Speaker 1: never gonna let you live that down. And we are

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Speaker 1: not real recording it. Let's move on. So yeah. Tesla

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Speaker 1: born on July tenth, eighteen fifty six, in what is

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Speaker 1: now Croatia, now eighteen fifty six by the Gregorian calendar.

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Speaker 1: If you have looked up at Tesla's birth and you

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Speaker 1: saw that it was actually in June June, that's because

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Speaker 1: at the time they were keeping time with the Julian calendar.

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Speaker 1: And it's only when you account for that when you

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Speaker 1: match those up that you realize that. Okay, well, if

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Speaker 1: you're using a real calendar like I do, the one

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Speaker 1: that's on my smartphone, and that's the only way I

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Speaker 1: know what day it is. It was July t So

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Speaker 1: eighteen fifty six July t and born in in Uh

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Speaker 1: part of Austria, Hungary which is now Croatia UM And

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Speaker 1: as a boy, he went to what we would think

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Speaker 1: of in the United States is elementary school or primary

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Speaker 1: school and studied German arithmetic and religion because his dad

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Speaker 1: was a pastor and his mom's father was a pastor,

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Speaker 1: both both in the Orthodox Church. Actually, so yeah, so

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Speaker 1: he definitely had a religious upbringing and his father really

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Speaker 1: wanted him to be a priest by the way, Yes,

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Speaker 1: he did a lot. In fact, he was not so

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Speaker 1: thrilled about Tesla going into engineering. UM. When he was

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Speaker 1: a young boy, Tesla's Tesla's older brother named Dane, died

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Speaker 1: in a tragic accident. He actually fell off a horse

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Speaker 1: and died. There were some stories that Tesla or Nicola

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Speaker 1: Tesla was playing around and spooked the horse that caused Yes,

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Speaker 1: so actually I've heard I'm sorry, I meant to I

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Speaker 1: meant to insert this earlier. But the very first terrific

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Speaker 1: tall tale that I heard about Tesla was that he

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Speaker 1: was born on a dark and storm and I to

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Speaker 1: lightning right right, He was born on the stroke of

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Speaker 1: midnight as lightning crashed in the sky, and that one

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Speaker 1: person said he would be a boy of storms, and

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Speaker 1: his mother said, no, he shall be a man of

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Speaker 1: the light. I might be inserting some of my hyper

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Speaker 1: bowl in there. Goodness, my gracious. So yeah, And as

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Speaker 1: a child they moved around quite a bit as his

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Speaker 1: father was finding a church to be pastor in. And

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Speaker 1: in eighteen seventy, so I remember he's born in eighteen

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Speaker 1: fifty six. By eighteen seventy he moves in with his

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Speaker 1: aunt and starts to attend a school that we're a

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Speaker 1: teacher named Martin skul Chick, sorry Skolich Sokolich. Uh So,

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Speaker 1: Martin Sokolich is teaching there, and he's teaching math and physics,

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Speaker 1: and Tesla finds both the professor and the subject matter fascinating,

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Speaker 1: and he becomes really focused on math and physics, and

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Speaker 1: in fact he's so focused he graduates a year early.

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Speaker 1: So he was certainly a man of genius. He possessed

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Speaker 1: a genius and an affinity for physics, for math, for

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Speaker 1: engineering that far outstripped most of his contemporaries. Oh yeah, definitely.

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Speaker 1: But then again, this is also the era where we

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Speaker 1: start seeing these technologies form and uh, and so it

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Speaker 1: was an exciting time if you were interested in physics,

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Speaker 1: because this is when we're making lots of big discoveries,

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Speaker 1: things that some people say are low hanging fruit, you know,

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Speaker 1: in retrospect, the idea that there were all these discoveries

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Speaker 1: to make. But it's hard to see how we're going

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Speaker 1: to advance from this point forward because all the quote

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Speaker 1: unquote easy things have been discovered. Not that any of

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Speaker 1: these things were easy, it's just that now you are

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Speaker 1: have to become increasingly specialized in whatever scientific fields you're

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Speaker 1: in to clearly understand it. Sure, but while doing this,

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Speaker 1: researcher kind of blew my mind. I actually don't have

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Speaker 1: a strong history in in electronic background, and and it

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Speaker 1: blew my mind that it wasn't until eighteen seventy three

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Speaker 1: that that James Clerk Maxwell proved that light is is

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Speaker 1: electromagnetic energy. Yeah, yes, this is He's he's growing up

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Speaker 1: at a time when uh, these discoveries are being made,

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Speaker 1: and that would impact his own work and in fact

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Speaker 1: drive him to achieve great things. Also, eighteen seventy three,

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Speaker 1: that was the year he contracted cholera. Yeah, and it

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Speaker 1: was due to the cholera that he kind of shaped

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Speaker 1: the rest of his life. Yeah. Well, yeah, quite a

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Speaker 1: few things. Because if you if you've heard about Tesla,

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Speaker 1: you know that he uh, he reportedly had a bit

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Speaker 1: of obsessive compulsive disorder, that he was a germophobe, that

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Speaker 1: he was a clean He was obsessed with being clean

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Speaker 1: and having cleaned things around him. He reported in his

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Speaker 1: own biography that he had a severe aversion to touching

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Speaker 1: other people's hair. That he had to do things if

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Speaker 1: if they require repetition, in the repetition of threes, and

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Speaker 1: if he did not, then he had to stop and restart. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so he may have developed some of the peculiarities. At

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Speaker 1: this time. He was in bed for about nine months,

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Speaker 1: nearly died a few times. So I would imagine that

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Speaker 1: was definitely something that would shape you, whether or not that.

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Speaker 1: I'm sure there were other issues that are beyond just

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Speaker 1: getting sick. There were probably some things that were psychologically

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Speaker 1: part of his being from the point where he was born.

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Speaker 1: But we don't know to what extent obviously, and um

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Speaker 1: and you know what's odd to me, I might as

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Speaker 1: well talk about this for right now. So neat freak,

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Speaker 1: if you want to put it that way. Germophobe doesn't

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Speaker 1: like touching people. Loved pigeons, loved them rats with wings,

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Speaker 1: that's what they are. Well, that that was, that was

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Speaker 1: also towards the end of his life that he became

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Speaker 1: obsessed with him became incredibly obsessed with pigeons. Yeah, it

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Speaker 1: just makes me think of that great scene in the

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Speaker 1: documentary The Producers, Boydes Filthy Rotten Boydes. I appreciate that

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Speaker 1: that your your Yiddish accent there is is better than mine.

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Speaker 1: That's excellent. I should also point out that that that's

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Speaker 1: the nineteen sixty eight version of the documentary The Producers,

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Speaker 1: not the musical version starring Nathan Lane. Matthew Broderick actually

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Speaker 1: has zero mostel Gene Wilder. I'm getting off track anyway.

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Speaker 1: Um so yeah, so he's he's definitely got some interesting personality.

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Speaker 1: Quirks eighteen seventy four. He starts to move around a

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Speaker 1: little bit, mostly hiding out from the army because in

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Speaker 1: that part of the world, in Austro Austrio, Austro Hungary. Look,

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Speaker 1: I can't say that. Uh yes we do, thank thank goodness.

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Speaker 1: We don't speak into a microphone for a living right. Uh.

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Speaker 1: But back in that time, in that part of the world,

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Speaker 1: army service was required of all young men. There was

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Speaker 1: three years mandatory service. And Tesla was not too keen

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Speaker 1: on doing that. So he kind of, um, he was dodging,

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Speaker 1: that's the best way of putting it. Uh. The next year,

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Speaker 1: eight five, he starts to attend the Austrian Polytechnic School

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Speaker 1: and he starts off really strong. He's doing really well

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Speaker 1: in his classes. He understands the concepts, and unlike some

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Speaker 1: other some other visionaries like say Stephen Hawking, he was

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Speaker 1: very good in school. Yep, yep. Also, you know, not

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Speaker 1: not like Einstein or some of the other famous folks

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Speaker 1: who seemed to have trouble in class. Now that that

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Speaker 1: was true for about a year, and then about that

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Speaker 1: second year, things began to take a little bit of

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Speaker 1: a dip because he began to point out shortcomings or

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Speaker 1: what he thought of as shortcomings in his professor's understanding

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Speaker 1: of things like electrical engineering and saying things like, you know,

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Speaker 1: you could build a device that does the same thing

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Speaker 1: without this one component that you are claiming is absolutely

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Speaker 1: necessary for it to work. That furthermore puts off gigantic

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Speaker 1: electrical shocks that are actually pretty dangerous, like you could

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Speaker 1: do it this way. And then, uh, if you mouth

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Speaker 1: off your professors often enough, you might find yourself in

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Speaker 1: some academic trouble. And that's kind of what Tesla did.

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Speaker 1: He he began to get disillusioned about pursuing studies in

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Speaker 1: an academic setting, and after about a little over three years,

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Speaker 1: he actually dropped out of the polytechnic school. So he

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Speaker 1: moved to Slovenia in eight to work as a draftsman

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Speaker 1: for an engineering firm, but by eighteen seventy nine, the

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Speaker 1: next year, some some police officials show up and asked

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Speaker 1: to see his residents papers, which he did not have,

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Speaker 1: so then he was escorted back to his family's home

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Speaker 1: because he didn't have a residence permit for Slovenia, And

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Speaker 1: that same year his father passes away, uh and Tesla

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Speaker 1: starts to a new career as a teacher in the

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Speaker 1: same school that he attended as a boy, but realizes

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Speaker 1: very quickly, that's not not for him. Yeah, he doesn't

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Speaker 1: want to do that. Um So Then the next year,

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Speaker 1: eighteen eighty, he moved to Prague. He tries to attend

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Speaker 1: Carl Ferdinand University, but he's unable to understand Greek or check,

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Speaker 1: both of which were prerequisites to attend as a student,

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Speaker 1: so instead he audits classes. Uh. And he begins to

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Speaker 1: work for the Budapest Telephone Exchange and also the Central

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Speaker 1: Telegraph Office. Eighteen eighty by the way, it was the

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Speaker 1: year that that Thomas Edison unveiled his electric incandescent lamp

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Speaker 1: to the public for the first time. Yep, so that's

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Speaker 1: a good thing to to keep in mind. There are

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Speaker 1: some big things happening at the same time that Tesla's

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Speaker 1: kind of you know, he hasn't really made a name

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Speaker 1: for himself yet. He's been a very enthusiastic student at

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Speaker 1: times of his life, and he is certainly interested in

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Speaker 1: electronics or really we should say electricity electronics too early,

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Speaker 1: but electricity and its applications. Um So, he does that

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Speaker 1: for a couple of years. In eighteen eighty too, he

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Speaker 1: joins the Continental Edison Company and begins to work on

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Speaker 1: things like dynamos, which are well, you've heard us talk

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Speaker 1: about dynamos and our episodes about electromagnets and motors and

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Speaker 1: uh induction in the reverse of that, so we I

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Speaker 1: won't go into it. But anyway, he starts to work

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Speaker 1: on that. Now this means that he becomes an employee,

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Speaker 1: although you know, indirectly and way down the line of Edison.

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Speaker 1: So yeah, he's sitting there working for the company of

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Speaker 1: the man who would one day become his greatest rival.

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Speaker 1: According to me, they have dragon ball style fights in

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Speaker 1: the sky. Yeah, they also would occasionally catch Pokemon, but

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Speaker 1: it was only the one that shoots the electricity. I

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Speaker 1: don't I don't know which one. Oh, come on, it's Pikachu.

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Speaker 1: I was just I was trying to bait Lauren to

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Speaker 1: see if I could get it. I actually know that

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Speaker 1: you win this time vocal bomb. So at this time

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Speaker 1: he also gets the idea for the A C induction motor,

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Speaker 1: although Asterisk not necessarily the first person to think about that.

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Speaker 1: Supposedly in a vision, well supposedly he had these visions.

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Speaker 1: Supposedly he was was very light and audio sensitive, and occasionally,

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Speaker 1: upon looking at one object or having a certain idea,

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Speaker 1: would would get an extremely strong visual perception of something

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Speaker 1: that he had already seen, or or of nothing, nothing

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Speaker 1: imaginary unless it was a new invention. But yeah, occasionally

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Speaker 1: he would get these flashes that that kind of disturbed

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Speaker 1: him a lot, according to his autobiography. Yeah, so essentially

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Speaker 1: what would happen is he would be walking through a

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Speaker 1: park and look at a beautiful scene, and then suddenly

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Speaker 1: an idea would form, fully formed in his head, like

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Speaker 1: not not something he had been puzzling about necessarily, It

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Speaker 1: might just be hey, boom, here are all the pieces

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Speaker 1: and the puzzle is completely it together. You know, we

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Speaker 1: opened up the box and the puzzles there, as opposed

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Speaker 1: to you've been trying to fix this problem for years,

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Speaker 1: and oh here's the inspiration. And so yeah. Supposedly he

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Speaker 1: was walking through the city park in Budapest with a

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Speaker 1: friend and saw a beautiful sunset and quoted some poetry

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Speaker 1: and then had an idea for for the induction motor. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and just drew it in the sand and then kept walking. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Whether or not that's true, it's hard to say. Because Tesla,

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Speaker 1: as it turns out, was something of a showman, a

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Speaker 1: little bit of an unreliable narrator. I would say unreliable

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Speaker 1: narrator is a very kind way of putting it. The

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Speaker 1: same sort of thing is true of all the big

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Speaker 1: names at this time, because they were the rock stars

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Speaker 1: of that of that era. So Edison, same sort of thing.

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Speaker 1: Edison was a master at at pr you know, beyond

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Speaker 1: beyond being the head of a very successful research and

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Speaker 1: development firm. He was very good at presenting his ideas

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Speaker 1: to a public and explaining why they were the best ideas,

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Speaker 1: even if they weren't the best ideas. Tesla was. He

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Speaker 1: was no slouch in that department either. There are a

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Speaker 1: lot of people who will paint Tesla as being the

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Speaker 1: the dedicated genius who is working for the betterment of

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Speaker 1: all mankind but doesn't ever look to get gain glory

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Speaker 1: in the process. That's not entirely accurate. Now, that's that's

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Speaker 1: not If you've ever seen any of the photographs that

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Speaker 1: that he took around his equipment, I would say that

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Speaker 1: those are not the mark of someone who is not

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Speaker 1: a showman. I saw this one photograph. He looked just

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Speaker 1: like David Bowie. Um might be mixing that up with

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Speaker 1: a documentary though, So then the the in in uh

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Speaker 1: in A ten two. This whole time where he's making

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Speaker 1: he's working for Edison. He's got this idea for the

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Speaker 1: A C induction motor. He also is reportedly not paid

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Speaker 1: some money for the work he's doing for Edison Company,

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Speaker 1: at least not not all of it. Like there's money

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Speaker 1: due to him that's not being paid. And this this

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Speaker 1: is partly what lays the groundwork for this whole idea

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Speaker 1: of the heated rivalry between Edison and Tesla. A lot

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Speaker 1: of it is money that's withheld from Tesla that was

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Speaker 1: promised to him. I mean, and yeah, and this this

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Speaker 1: is when he was very he was what twenty six

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Speaker 1: at the time, and in Paris, and so he was

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Speaker 1: he was really distantly connected from to Edison at the time.

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Speaker 1: But apparently grudge started, right you use this, If you

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Speaker 1: use this and just say like this is indicative of

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Speaker 1: how Edison treats people, it would apparently become company policy

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Speaker 1: not to pay people for their work. That's what that's

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Speaker 1: what suggested of this. It also becomes you know, a

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Speaker 1: common thread in Tesla's life of getting getting cheated out

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Speaker 1: of things that were owed him, which makes you wonder

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Speaker 1: if it happens so frequently. Why is that? Is it

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Speaker 1: all due to Was it just that he only worked

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Speaker 1: with corrupt individuals and companies, or was it that there

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Speaker 1: was something else going on here? Besides that part of

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Speaker 1: the story, I have no doubt that Tesla was really

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Speaker 1: cheated out of many of the things he deserved. I'm

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Speaker 1: not sure that he was cheated out of everything that

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Speaker 1: is attributed as beingthing he deserved. Um, but then we'll

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Speaker 1: get into that again. Yeo, he makes the big move

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Speaker 1: from Europe to America. He he had basically no money

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Speaker 1: at the time. From what I understand, well, he definitely

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Speaker 1: had no money by the time he got there. Um. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it took a little longer for him to get there

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Speaker 1: than he had anticipated. According to one timeline I read

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Speaker 1: the ship he was on. This is just Tesla's luck, right,

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Speaker 1: The ship he was on had a mutiny aboard the ship.

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Speaker 1: Oh my goodness. I did not read about this, and

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Speaker 1: supposedly Tesla himself was nearly thrown overboard, probably for being

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Speaker 1: a witch. That that last part is just me guessing.

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Speaker 1: I didn't have any reason. I didn't have. There was

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Speaker 1: no reason given as to why Tesla would have been

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Speaker 1: thrown overboard, so I'm just inventing one. But no, apparently

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Speaker 1: the ship he was on had a mutiny aboard it.

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Speaker 1: I ended up getting to New York way later than

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Speaker 1: when he expected, and, according to some reports, had four

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Speaker 1: cents in his pocket. Now, also, depending upon whom you asked,

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Speaker 1: he either immediately went to work for Edison, as in

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Speaker 1: got off the boat, filed and went into the office,

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Speaker 1: or he started the next day. That seems to be

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Speaker 1: the two stories. Either way, I think that's pretty remarkable.

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Speaker 1: Um and uh. And he works for Edison and he's

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Speaker 1: helping them with their systems. Uh. Supposedly again, he started

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Speaker 1: to suggest to Edison that they switched to an alternating

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Speaker 1: current model as opposed to direct current, and Ederson was

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Speaker 1: very much against that idea. So then in eighteen five,

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Speaker 1: Tesla forms the Tesla Electric Light Company. An investor group

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Speaker 1: actually asks him if he will work on an ARC

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Speaker 1: lighting system, and he agrees to do it, and then

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Speaker 1: is later forced out of his own company when nothing

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Speaker 1: to show for it. Was Was that all? I mean?

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Speaker 1: Because he started the company because he had been he

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Speaker 1: had quit Edison's correct. Yeah, Essentially, that same year, he

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Speaker 1: resigns from the Edison Company, and some say the reason

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Speaker 1: he did that was because, again, here's another story of

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Speaker 1: Tesla getting cheated. That Edison had promised Tesla a princely

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Speaker 1: some fifty thou dollars for a particular project, and when

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Speaker 1: Tesla completed the project again supposedly with flying colors and

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Speaker 1: beyond all expectations, Edison then said, ha, ha, you don't

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Speaker 1: understand American humor. I'm not giving you any money, and

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Speaker 1: then Tesla resigns, even though Edison supposedly at that point

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Speaker 1: offered an enormous raise to keep Tesla there. This makes

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Speaker 1: Edison look like the biggest jerk on the face of

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Speaker 1: the planet. I mean, I can't imagine my boss coming

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Speaker 1: up to me and saying, hey, you know when I

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Speaker 1: told you were going to make fifty dollars if you

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Speaker 1: did this thing, and then you did that thing, you

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Speaker 1: did it really well. Well, you're not gonna get any money.

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Speaker 1: Oh you want to leave, I'll raise your salary. That

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Speaker 1: just like what kind of crazy person does that? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it doesn't it doesn't sound I mean, you know it

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Speaker 1: could I start. I never met Edison, didn't did you

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Speaker 1: mean him? You're very old? Uh? Tesla then claimed that

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Speaker 1: he spent the next year making money by digging ditches.

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Speaker 1: So again, a great, great story if you're looking at

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Speaker 1: his life in the terms of like a tragic tale.

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Speaker 1: You know, here you have this genius of super genius,

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Speaker 1: the man who will one day light up the United

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Speaker 1: States with his alternating current power grid, making money scraping

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Speaker 1: by by digging ditches. Yeah. Again, a lot of this

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Speaker 1: comes from Tesla himself, and whether or not all of

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Speaker 1: it is true, it remains part of myth. You know,

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Speaker 1: I don't doubt that. I don't doubt there were some

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Speaker 1: bad business dealings. I'm sure that was the case, and

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Speaker 1: I don't doubt he had some hard times and maybe

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Speaker 1: he did make his living for a full year being

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Speaker 1: you know, digging ditches and that was the only thing

395
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Speaker 1: he could do. But it sounds more, it sounds like melodrama.

396
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Speaker 1: But sometimes like works like that, sometimes that's the Sometimes

397
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Speaker 1: that's the truth. Stranger things. But anyway, h then by

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Speaker 1: by e eight seven, so you know A six digging ditches,

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Speaker 1: we don't need to go into as that's it. Well,

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Speaker 1: I mean, meanwhile, in eighteen eighties, actually it's interesting Westinghouse

401
00:23:01,680 --> 00:23:04,960
Speaker 1: Electric had developed a transformer for commercial use. Yeah, so

402
00:23:05,480 --> 00:23:08,239
Speaker 1: that's another thing we should mention is that, uh, one

403
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Speaker 1: of the reasons Tesla was really pushing for this alternating

404
00:23:10,800 --> 00:23:14,040
Speaker 1: current thing with Edison is that back in Europe, that's

405
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Speaker 1: what they were using a C was, That's that's the

406
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Speaker 1: route they took. They didn't they didn't go down the

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Speaker 1: direct current route at all. They went with alternating current.

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Speaker 1: And that becomes important when we start talking about the

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Speaker 1: myths of of Tesla as well. In a little bit, right, Yeah,

410
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Speaker 1: the the U s so embroiled in d C current.

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Speaker 1: The name the Brooklyn Dodgers actually comes because they were

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Speaker 1: using direct current power lines that were kind of haphazardly

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Speaker 1: strung across the city and and Brooklyn Nights had to

414
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Speaker 1: dodge these lines so often that their team was thus

415
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Speaker 1: named the Brooklyn Dodging, whereas the New York Giants were

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Speaker 1: called that because they came from a race of mythical

417
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Speaker 1: creatures that lived up Giant. Okay, now, I just wanted

418
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Speaker 1: to show off that I knew something too, but I

419
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Speaker 1: don't really know anything. After the ditch digging has finished,

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Speaker 1: Tesla begins to work within Besters again, and he establishes

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Speaker 1: a lab at eighty nine Liberty Street in New York

422
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Speaker 1: and then a few blocks away from Medicine's. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And the next year he starts to talk about a

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Speaker 1: C motors and transformers for the American Institute of Electrical

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Speaker 1: Engineers now known as the Triple E, or as I

426
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Speaker 1: always prefer to call them. I that once for all

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Speaker 1: you engineers out there. Uh. And he also agrees to

428
00:24:25,720 --> 00:24:29,840
Speaker 1: start selling patents to George Westinghouse. So even though you know, Lauren,

429
00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:32,840
Speaker 1: like Lauren was saying, in eighteen eighty six, you already

430
00:24:32,840 --> 00:24:36,119
Speaker 1: had Westinghouse working on transformers and alternating current. That was

431
00:24:36,160 --> 00:24:39,760
Speaker 1: before Tesla had even started to work for Westinghouse. Uh.

432
00:24:39,800 --> 00:24:42,240
Speaker 1: That that's something to keep in mind as well. So

433
00:24:42,480 --> 00:24:45,800
Speaker 1: eighteen eighty nine he establishes a new lab on Grand

434
00:24:45,840 --> 00:24:47,800
Speaker 1: Street in New York. There's a lot of labs. He

435
00:24:47,840 --> 00:24:50,680
Speaker 1: had a lot of labs spread out throughout New York.

436
00:24:50,680 --> 00:24:54,960
Speaker 1: He also lived in hotels mostly, did he even then? Yeah,

437
00:24:55,080 --> 00:24:57,159
Speaker 1: mostly towards the end of his life, but yeah, early

438
00:24:57,200 --> 00:24:58,760
Speaker 1: on he was living in a lot of hotels as well.

439
00:24:58,760 --> 00:25:00,920
Speaker 1: I think he also joked about about how is his hours,

440
00:25:01,000 --> 00:25:03,080
Speaker 1: especially when he was working in Edison's lab. We're from

441
00:25:03,080 --> 00:25:05,199
Speaker 1: like ten in the morning until five thirty am the

442
00:25:05,240 --> 00:25:07,560
Speaker 1: next day, and and so that a lot of his

443
00:25:07,600 --> 00:25:10,440
Speaker 1: sleeping A wasn't really sleeping, and B was probably under

444
00:25:10,440 --> 00:25:14,080
Speaker 1: his desk, right right, I can identify with that. Uh

445
00:25:14,200 --> 00:25:18,000
Speaker 1: In he begins to experiment with wireless power in florest

446
00:25:18,040 --> 00:25:21,359
Speaker 1: and neon lighting, as well as X rays, although at

447
00:25:21,359 --> 00:25:23,879
Speaker 1: the time he isn't sure exactly what they are. He

448
00:25:23,960 --> 00:25:29,399
Speaker 1: was shadow pictures. Yeah, this was before Wilhelm Laurentin had

449
00:25:29,960 --> 00:25:32,120
Speaker 1: really established what X rays were and what they could do.

450
00:25:32,520 --> 00:25:36,159
Speaker 1: So Tesla was one of the people who was observing

451
00:25:36,240 --> 00:25:39,879
Speaker 1: the phenomena of X rays early early on. Yeah, there

452
00:25:39,920 --> 00:25:41,239
Speaker 1: are a few other people at the time who were

453
00:25:41,280 --> 00:25:43,640
Speaker 1: working with them, but yeah, yeah, yeah, in fact, that'll

454
00:25:43,680 --> 00:25:47,879
Speaker 1: go into the myths as well. But then he becomes

455
00:25:47,920 --> 00:25:51,320
Speaker 1: an Americans and also I believe patented the Tesla coil.

456
00:25:51,840 --> 00:25:56,920
Speaker 1: There you go an interesting thing in his mother passes away.

457
00:25:57,560 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 1: That same year, he becomes the vice president of the

458
00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:03,919
Speaker 1: AI Triple E, which is even it's a I E.

459
00:26:04,480 --> 00:26:06,840
Speaker 1: I guess that is how I would say that. And

460
00:26:06,840 --> 00:26:10,520
Speaker 1: he becomes famous worldwide for his lectures on alternating current

461
00:26:11,000 --> 00:26:13,359
Speaker 1: So at this point he's on the lecture circuit. I

462
00:26:13,359 --> 00:26:16,239
Speaker 1: mean he's he's going from city to city. You know,

463
00:26:16,359 --> 00:26:21,760
Speaker 1: he stopped in places like Chicago and New York, London, Paris.

464
00:26:22,400 --> 00:26:25,600
Speaker 1: So he becomes again, like I said, like a rock star.

465
00:26:25,920 --> 00:26:28,919
Speaker 1: He's known for these lectures, and it sounds weird for

466
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:30,960
Speaker 1: us to say that that he's like a rock star.

467
00:26:31,040 --> 00:26:35,560
Speaker 1: But this was an era where these these thinkers were

468
00:26:35,600 --> 00:26:39,760
Speaker 1: really pushing the development of technology to a point where

469
00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:43,160
Speaker 1: everyone was sure that, you know, okay, we're five years

470
00:26:43,160 --> 00:26:46,360
Speaker 1: away from the incredible future. And in many ways they

471
00:26:46,359 --> 00:26:48,679
Speaker 1: were right. It's just that their view of what the

472
00:26:48,720 --> 00:26:50,760
Speaker 1: incredible future would be ended up being a lot different

473
00:26:50,760 --> 00:26:53,840
Speaker 1: from what it really was. But it was an era

474
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:56,560
Speaker 1: of rapid development, so these guys were considered to be

475
00:26:57,040 --> 00:27:00,600
Speaker 1: the people pushing that rapid development is really exciting. Yeah,

476
00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:02,720
Speaker 1: and think things like when the Chicago World Fair was

477
00:27:02,760 --> 00:27:06,960
Speaker 1: that was that? Want to say? Yeah? That was that

478
00:27:07,040 --> 00:27:10,240
Speaker 1: was famous because there was a whole Edison Tesla story

479
00:27:10,320 --> 00:27:13,000
Speaker 1: there about who is going to provide power? Right, and

480
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:17,040
Speaker 1: it was really Edison versus H. Westinghouse. Yeah, but I

481
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:20,280
Speaker 1: mean Westinghouse back by Tesla. Sure, sure, yeah. West Westinghouse

482
00:27:20,320 --> 00:27:24,800
Speaker 1: was using technology that Tesla had patented and and systems

483
00:27:24,800 --> 00:27:29,040
Speaker 1: that Tesla worked on, but it was not truly Tesla

484
00:27:29,200 --> 00:27:31,760
Speaker 1: versus Edison. That's that's kind of how I think. Even

485
00:27:31,800 --> 00:27:33,760
Speaker 1: in a previous episode of Tech Stuff, we sort of

486
00:27:33,800 --> 00:27:36,159
Speaker 1: talked about it in those terms, because that's sort of

487
00:27:36,200 --> 00:27:39,320
Speaker 1: the romantic way of doing it, right as the idea

488
00:27:39,359 --> 00:27:41,920
Speaker 1: of these two geniuses facing off against each other and

489
00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:45,080
Speaker 1: who will win and alternating current one out in that one.

490
00:27:45,119 --> 00:27:48,200
Speaker 1: So it was really Westinghouse that one, all right, right, Yeah,

491
00:27:48,200 --> 00:27:49,359
Speaker 1: The story goes that there was a there was a

492
00:27:49,400 --> 00:27:53,480
Speaker 1: business deal the government was looking to contract either either

493
00:27:53,520 --> 00:27:56,680
Speaker 1: Westinghouses Company or Edison's company to power the World's Fair

494
00:27:56,840 --> 00:28:00,800
Speaker 1: and and Westinghouse one out because it was cheaper. Yep. Yeah,

495
00:28:01,080 --> 00:28:03,040
Speaker 1: and then and when and yeah, and when they threw

496
00:28:03,040 --> 00:28:05,440
Speaker 1: when President grawf for Cleveland, I think it was through

497
00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:09,480
Speaker 1: that switch and which like a hundred hundred thousand bulbs

498
00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:12,520
Speaker 1: lit up all at the same time, and people were like, oh, oh,

499
00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:15,119
Speaker 1: this is a thing trivia for you folks out there

500
00:28:15,160 --> 00:28:17,880
Speaker 1: who don't know your history. Grover Cleveland was the only

501
00:28:17,920 --> 00:28:21,639
Speaker 1: president to serve two non consecutive terms as president. He

502
00:28:21,760 --> 00:28:25,840
Speaker 1: was president, then he wasn't president. Then he was president again. Yes,

503
00:28:26,040 --> 00:28:30,760
Speaker 1: he also liked the song Funky called Medina eighteen five.

504
00:28:31,400 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 1: So then one of the buildings that heused, one of

505
00:28:34,080 --> 00:28:38,520
Speaker 1: Tesla's labs, caught fire in eight and his lab burned down,

506
00:28:38,720 --> 00:28:42,360
Speaker 1: and the fire destroyed what was estimated to be about

507
00:28:42,480 --> 00:28:46,520
Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollars worth of equipment. And and he had

508
00:28:46,680 --> 00:28:50,680
Speaker 1: no insurance. Yeah, and fifty that's it's a lot of

509
00:28:50,720 --> 00:28:54,080
Speaker 1: money today. It was a huge amount of money in

510
00:28:55,760 --> 00:28:59,120
Speaker 1: um And and at the time he was experimenting with

511
00:28:59,400 --> 00:29:03,400
Speaker 1: with radios. Yeah, and and supposedly, according to him, was

512
00:29:03,440 --> 00:29:06,400
Speaker 1: ready to transmit a signal fifty miles out to West Point,

513
00:29:06,400 --> 00:29:09,040
Speaker 1: New York. Yeah. So that this is during if you've

514
00:29:09,080 --> 00:29:11,640
Speaker 1: listened to the Old Tech Stuff episode about who invented

515
00:29:11,640 --> 00:29:14,280
Speaker 1: the radio, there's a lot about Tesla and Marconi. And

516
00:29:14,320 --> 00:29:17,400
Speaker 1: there there's a whole story there too about how Marconi,

517
00:29:17,560 --> 00:29:20,600
Speaker 1: like Tesla, got a patent for for the radio. Then

518
00:29:20,680 --> 00:29:24,120
Speaker 1: Marconi applied for a patent, Then the patent office overturned

519
00:29:24,120 --> 00:29:27,800
Speaker 1: Tesla's patent, gave Marconi the patent, and then later on

520
00:29:28,080 --> 00:29:30,160
Speaker 1: overturned it again and gave it back to Tesla. And

521
00:29:30,280 --> 00:29:32,880
Speaker 1: later on is in like the nineteen seventies after Tesla

522
00:29:32,920 --> 00:29:36,760
Speaker 1: was dead long after. Um. Yeah, there's a whole story,

523
00:29:36,840 --> 00:29:40,560
Speaker 1: and and there's there's arguments there too, because again, the

524
00:29:40,600 --> 00:29:44,000
Speaker 1: invention of any sort of technology requires that you talk

525
00:29:44,080 --> 00:29:47,200
Speaker 1: about so many different people who who contributed to the

526
00:29:47,680 --> 00:29:51,000
Speaker 1: discoveries that led to the possibility of something existing that

527
00:29:51,160 --> 00:29:53,480
Speaker 1: it's impossible to actually point at one person and say

528
00:29:53,520 --> 00:29:56,960
Speaker 1: this person invented radio. But both Marconi and Tesla were

529
00:29:56,960 --> 00:30:00,959
Speaker 1: working on it, and uh, and there's argument over who

530
00:30:01,000 --> 00:30:06,560
Speaker 1: should have real credit there. Uh, but go listen to

531
00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:08,480
Speaker 1: our episode about who invented the radio if you want

532
00:30:08,480 --> 00:30:10,440
Speaker 1: to hear more about that, because I think that that

533
00:30:10,440 --> 00:30:13,320
Speaker 1: that that argument is so long and detailed that it's

534
00:30:13,360 --> 00:30:16,240
Speaker 1: hard to sum up in an episode just about Tesla. Yeah. Yeah,

535
00:30:16,240 --> 00:30:19,000
Speaker 1: though it's yeah, certainly another another one of those points

536
00:30:19,040 --> 00:30:20,600
Speaker 1: that people like to bring up in terms of he

537
00:30:20,680 --> 00:30:23,760
Speaker 1: was so downtrodden. Yeah, it's a good another point. Yeah,

538
00:30:23,800 --> 00:30:25,680
Speaker 1: and and that's a more firm one that Yeah, he

539
00:30:25,960 --> 00:30:28,560
Speaker 1: absolutely lost that fight and lost probably a lot of

540
00:30:28,600 --> 00:30:31,800
Speaker 1: money in fame. I think. Uh, Marconi won the New

541
00:30:31,840 --> 00:30:37,000
Speaker 1: Belt Prize all kinds of fun. Was not happy about that. Excited. Yeah,

542
00:30:38,400 --> 00:30:41,880
Speaker 1: he demonstrated a wirelessly controlled model boat, so essentially a

543
00:30:41,880 --> 00:30:46,080
Speaker 1: an RC boat at the Electrical Exposition in Madison Square

544
00:30:46,120 --> 00:30:49,240
Speaker 1: Garden where years later, Highlanders would fight it out to

545
00:30:49,320 --> 00:30:52,960
Speaker 1: determine who would win the prize, and Queen would sing

546
00:30:54,160 --> 00:30:56,160
Speaker 1: Princess of the Universe in the background. I didn't I

547
00:30:56,200 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 1: didn't really like that documentary. WHOA, Okay, you know what,

548
00:30:59,440 --> 00:31:01,880
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a little break here. Let's let's take

549
00:31:01,880 --> 00:31:11,520
Speaker 1: a take a moment to thank our sponsor, and now

550
00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:15,480
Speaker 1: back to our show. Alright, getting back into Tesla's life.

551
00:31:15,720 --> 00:31:20,800
Speaker 1: In moves to Colorado to perform some experiments with wireless power.

552
00:31:20,840 --> 00:31:23,240
Speaker 1: And now this is where one of the big myths

553
00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:26,959
Speaker 1: about Tesla comes up. This idea that he wanted to

554
00:31:27,080 --> 00:31:31,280
Speaker 1: build this huge tower that would tap into the this

555
00:31:31,280 --> 00:31:34,480
Speaker 1: this resonant frequency that exists around the world, and that

556
00:31:34,720 --> 00:31:40,239
Speaker 1: you could transmit power wirelessly across miles of space. Um.

557
00:31:40,280 --> 00:31:42,200
Speaker 1: He claimed that he had another one of those visions

558
00:31:42,280 --> 00:31:46,440
Speaker 1: that let him understand the geoelectrical phenomenon he called terrest

559
00:31:46,520 --> 00:31:49,800
Speaker 1: real stationary waves, an idea about tapping into the Earth

560
00:31:49,840 --> 00:31:54,720
Speaker 1: itself as a conductor. Okay, sounds interesting, Yeah, and it's

561
00:31:54,800 --> 00:31:58,200
Speaker 1: not that it's not that everything was that he said

562
00:31:58,320 --> 00:32:00,960
Speaker 1: was crazy or it was just to be able to

563
00:32:01,040 --> 00:32:04,880
Speaker 1: actually use this in a way that would allow you

564
00:32:04,920 --> 00:32:10,280
Speaker 1: to transmit power reliably safely without losing power over distance

565
00:32:10,400 --> 00:32:14,400
Speaker 1: or zapping and killing everybody. Uh is something we haven't

566
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:15,840
Speaker 1: solved yet, And there are a lot of people who

567
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:18,959
Speaker 1: say that all of his work would have proven if

568
00:32:19,040 --> 00:32:23,120
Speaker 1: if it's still existed. Get into more about more destruction

569
00:32:23,120 --> 00:32:25,040
Speaker 1: of his work and where it all when it went to.

570
00:32:25,600 --> 00:32:28,320
Speaker 1: But then if it's still existed, it would prove that

571
00:32:28,400 --> 00:32:30,400
Speaker 1: this sort of thing is possible, and it's only the

572
00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:33,160
Speaker 1: energy companies that are keeping it down because they stand

573
00:32:33,200 --> 00:32:35,920
Speaker 1: to lose so much if this If this information got out,

574
00:32:36,720 --> 00:32:40,080
Speaker 1: I'm hesitant to agree to anything like that because it

575
00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:42,880
Speaker 1: suggests that no one but Tesla could have ever come

576
00:32:42,960 --> 00:32:46,800
Speaker 1: up with this, and therefore the idea is lost forever.

577
00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:49,880
Speaker 1: When I would argue, we have people who are far

578
00:32:50,120 --> 00:32:53,920
Speaker 1: more informed about electrical engineering than Tesla was, even though

579
00:32:53,920 --> 00:32:56,760
Speaker 1: he was a brilliant man, forward thinking, and maybe let's

580
00:32:56,760 --> 00:32:59,280
Speaker 1: have you know, perhaps the people these days are not

581
00:32:59,760 --> 00:33:02,240
Speaker 1: vision nary the way that he was. But yeah, maybe

582
00:33:02,400 --> 00:33:04,040
Speaker 1: maybe that's it. Maybe they just need to take a

583
00:33:04,040 --> 00:33:06,640
Speaker 1: walk in the park and look at the sunset, think

584
00:33:06,680 --> 00:33:09,800
Speaker 1: about some poetry that would help. I guess, you know, hey,

585
00:33:10,040 --> 00:33:12,080
Speaker 1: far be it from me to downplay the importance of

586
00:33:12,120 --> 00:33:14,840
Speaker 1: poetry in the world. I certainly think it's important being

587
00:33:15,120 --> 00:33:19,120
Speaker 1: English lit major. Uh. In nineteen o one, well, all right,

588
00:33:19,120 --> 00:33:21,720
Speaker 1: so so he starts to think really about wireless power

589
00:33:21,840 --> 00:33:25,200
Speaker 1: and the phenomena that it would be, Like what what

590
00:33:25,240 --> 00:33:28,120
Speaker 1: would go into making this and how it would change

591
00:33:28,160 --> 00:33:30,280
Speaker 1: the world. And he really was thinking it was an

592
00:33:30,320 --> 00:33:33,560
Speaker 1: interesting idea. So in nineteen o one, with funding from

593
00:33:33,640 --> 00:33:37,880
Speaker 1: various sources, including people like JP Morgan, he starts to

594
00:33:38,080 --> 00:33:41,960
Speaker 1: build the Warden Cliff Tower. And this is at a

595
00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:46,160
Speaker 1: long island sound and uh, this is um this thing

596
00:33:46,280 --> 00:33:50,080
Speaker 1: is supposed to be a wireless power transmitting station essentially,

597
00:33:50,640 --> 00:33:53,040
Speaker 1: and within nineteen o three starts to test it, even

598
00:33:53,080 --> 00:33:55,920
Speaker 1: though the tower itself is not completed at that point.

599
00:33:56,440 --> 00:33:58,240
Speaker 1: And this this was this was a tower that that

600
00:33:58,360 --> 00:34:00,480
Speaker 1: again reached deep into the ground, took d of tap

601
00:34:00,520 --> 00:34:05,640
Speaker 1: into this this terrestrial uh wave stationary way. I actually

602
00:34:05,640 --> 00:34:07,800
Speaker 1: have a really great quote from Tesla. If I had

603
00:34:07,920 --> 00:34:11,000
Speaker 1: made out excellent in the system that I've invented, it

604
00:34:11,080 --> 00:34:12,799
Speaker 1: is necessary for the machine to get a grip on

605
00:34:12,840 --> 00:34:15,000
Speaker 1: the earth. Otherwise it cannot shake the earth. It has

606
00:34:15,040 --> 00:34:16,680
Speaker 1: to have a grip so that the whole of this

607
00:34:16,800 --> 00:34:20,400
Speaker 1: globe can quiver. Yeah, if you also remember the story

608
00:34:20,440 --> 00:34:24,239
Speaker 1: about Tesla putting an oscillating motor onto a building and

609
00:34:24,239 --> 00:34:27,040
Speaker 1: then nearly shaking it to its foundation, that kind of

610
00:34:27,160 --> 00:34:32,520
Speaker 1: dates from the same sort of concept. And the Earth

611
00:34:32,560 --> 00:34:34,160
Speaker 1: is still here, by the way, So that's kind of

612
00:34:34,160 --> 00:34:37,279
Speaker 1: a spoiler alert to how this story plays out. MythBusters

613
00:34:37,320 --> 00:34:39,920
Speaker 1: actually actually cracked that one in the episode back in

614
00:34:39,920 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 1: A two six, I think they showed. They showed that

615
00:34:42,120 --> 00:34:46,160
Speaker 1: it could, like a small repetitive motion could cause a

616
00:34:46,280 --> 00:34:49,920
Speaker 1: bridge to start to shake a little enough to notice

617
00:34:49,960 --> 00:34:52,920
Speaker 1: a couple couple hundred feet away, right, but not necessarily

618
00:34:53,080 --> 00:34:57,920
Speaker 1: enough to to make it crumble into pieces. Um, but anyway,

619
00:34:57,920 --> 00:35:00,799
Speaker 1: we all earthquake. Warncliffe Tower becomes an important part of

620
00:35:00,840 --> 00:35:02,880
Speaker 1: Tesla's life. He was one of these things that he

621
00:35:03,120 --> 00:35:07,200
Speaker 1: really thought that that the terrestrial stationary waves was the

622
00:35:07,280 --> 00:35:10,000
Speaker 1: uh discovery of his life. That was the most important

623
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:13,080
Speaker 1: out of everything that he had worked with with alternating current,

624
00:35:13,080 --> 00:35:16,640
Speaker 1: with transformers, with all these other technologies, those paled in

625
00:35:16,680 --> 00:35:19,400
Speaker 1: comparison to this one and so Warncliffe Tower was very

626
00:35:19,400 --> 00:35:24,040
Speaker 1: important to him. Unfortunately, Uh, there weren't. He didn't have

627
00:35:24,040 --> 00:35:26,920
Speaker 1: a whole lot to show for it. And also he

628
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:30,160
Speaker 1: was running up the electric bill. Yeah yeah, and Morgan

629
00:35:30,239 --> 00:35:32,759
Speaker 1: was getting pretty sick of it. Meanwhile across the ocean, Um,

630
00:35:33,040 --> 00:35:36,359
Speaker 1: Marconi had signaled the letter as across the Atlantic. Then

631
00:35:36,480 --> 00:35:39,680
Speaker 1: that didn't make Tesla happy. And and I mean and

632
00:35:39,680 --> 00:35:42,480
Speaker 1: and you know Marconi was such a such a newspaper darling.

633
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:45,200
Speaker 1: Yeah he was again and yet another person who was

634
00:35:45,320 --> 00:35:48,000
Speaker 1: very good at catering to the media to get a

635
00:35:48,000 --> 00:35:52,600
Speaker 1: message across. So uh, you know, not unusual at this time.

636
00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:55,799
Speaker 1: So in nineteen o four, the Colorado Lab is torn

637
00:35:55,880 --> 00:35:58,520
Speaker 1: down due to excessive use of electricity and the building

638
00:35:58,560 --> 00:36:02,440
Speaker 1: materials are sold for scrap to pay for the cost couch.

639
00:36:02,920 --> 00:36:05,000
Speaker 1: And in nineteen o six, like you said, JP, Morgan,

640
00:36:05,040 --> 00:36:07,600
Speaker 1: who had been an investor withdraws and Tesla has to

641
00:36:07,680 --> 00:36:09,520
Speaker 1: end up laying off a lot of employees over at

642
00:36:09,520 --> 00:36:12,680
Speaker 1: Warncliff Tower. Uh, We're gonna skip ahead a few years

643
00:36:12,680 --> 00:36:16,239
Speaker 1: because this is essentially where he's working on this Warncliff

644
00:36:16,320 --> 00:36:20,640
Speaker 1: Tower experiment, which ends up draining a lot of his

645
00:36:20,800 --> 00:36:24,879
Speaker 1: energy literally and resources, and without a lot to show

646
00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:27,240
Speaker 1: for it. Um the next day, I have his nineteen

647
00:36:27,239 --> 00:36:32,000
Speaker 1: eleven when he started working with steam turbines and electricity production. Uh.

648
00:36:32,200 --> 00:36:35,680
Speaker 1: He was. This was a big development. It was very

649
00:36:35,719 --> 00:36:39,879
Speaker 1: important in the whole uh part of generating electricity for

650
00:36:39,920 --> 00:36:42,560
Speaker 1: a growing need in America because at this point you're

651
00:36:42,560 --> 00:36:46,800
Speaker 1: starting to see communities get wired for electricity and beyond

652
00:36:46,880 --> 00:36:50,200
Speaker 1: just the narrow band in the Northeast that had it,

653
00:36:50,520 --> 00:36:53,480
Speaker 1: So it was important to find different ways of generating it,

654
00:36:53,560 --> 00:36:57,160
Speaker 1: beyond firing from coal plants. She wanted to find something

655
00:36:57,160 --> 00:37:01,160
Speaker 1: that was sustainable even at that time, and in ninetelve

656
00:37:01,320 --> 00:37:04,799
Speaker 1: Tesla suffered another setback, although not one nearly as large

657
00:37:04,800 --> 00:37:09,480
Speaker 1: as Lady Astor. John Jacob Astor was one of Tesla's

658
00:37:09,560 --> 00:37:15,839
Speaker 1: most wealthy and enthusiastic investors, stopped investing in Tesla's work

659
00:37:15,960 --> 00:37:19,560
Speaker 1: because he stopped breathing. He was at board a little

660
00:37:19,600 --> 00:37:22,279
Speaker 1: boat called the Titanic. Oh, I've heard of that one.

661
00:37:22,360 --> 00:37:24,560
Speaker 1: I think I saw a documentary about it one. Yeah,

662
00:37:24,600 --> 00:37:28,880
Speaker 1: his heart will go on, but his investment payments stopped. Yeah.

663
00:37:28,920 --> 00:37:32,319
Speaker 1: He Um. He went down with the boat. He did

664
00:37:32,360 --> 00:37:35,919
Speaker 1: get Lady Astor on a lifeboat, so he made sure

665
00:37:35,960 --> 00:37:39,720
Speaker 1: his wife was safe, and he stayed behind to wait

666
00:37:39,800 --> 00:37:42,560
Speaker 1: for his turn to get on a lifeboat, but tragically

667
00:37:42,719 --> 00:37:45,479
Speaker 1: was not able to do that and he did die,

668
00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:49,200
Speaker 1: and with that Tesla lost one of his most significant

669
00:37:49,200 --> 00:37:53,960
Speaker 1: sources of investment money. So it was another financial setback

670
00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:57,440
Speaker 1: for Tesla. Um. I don't think he could blame that

671
00:37:57,440 --> 00:38:01,520
Speaker 1: one on Edison. No, No, maybe Mark Coni, because we're

672
00:38:01,520 --> 00:38:05,279
Speaker 1: talking about the use of radios on the Titanic, But

673
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:08,080
Speaker 1: then that was more of a personnel thing than a

674
00:38:08,239 --> 00:38:12,560
Speaker 1: technology thing. A nineteen fifteen, Tesla and Edison are both

675
00:38:13,360 --> 00:38:20,040
Speaker 1: listed as being uh considered for a Nobel Prize and

676
00:38:20,080 --> 00:38:23,400
Speaker 1: that they would be co recipients of the Nobel Prize.

677
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:27,920
Speaker 1: When the Nobel Prizes are announced, the prize goes to

678
00:38:28,480 --> 00:38:33,319
Speaker 1: two people. That would be William Henry Bragg and his son.

679
00:38:34,520 --> 00:38:38,239
Speaker 1: Now the Nobel Committee admitted that Edison and Tesla were

680
00:38:38,280 --> 00:38:40,680
Speaker 1: under consideration for the Nobel Prize, but they did not

681
00:38:40,719 --> 00:38:43,560
Speaker 1: say any more than that. What has come up since

682
00:38:43,600 --> 00:38:47,600
Speaker 1: then as the rumor, which is gospel in some corners

683
00:38:47,640 --> 00:38:49,880
Speaker 1: of the Internet, that the reason why Tesla and Edison

684
00:38:49,920 --> 00:38:53,280
Speaker 1: did not receive the Nobel Prize together is because they'd

685
00:38:53,360 --> 00:38:56,920
Speaker 1: rather be caught dead than to share a prize with

686
00:38:57,000 --> 00:39:00,239
Speaker 1: the other man. That's a that's a good myth that

687
00:39:00,280 --> 00:39:03,040
Speaker 1: the rivalry was so great that they would both refuse

688
00:39:03,160 --> 00:39:05,600
Speaker 1: a Nobel prize rather than have to share it with

689
00:39:05,640 --> 00:39:08,680
Speaker 1: the other That's pretty amazing. And it may be true

690
00:39:09,080 --> 00:39:11,239
Speaker 1: that when I say rumor, I don't mean that it's

691
00:39:11,320 --> 00:39:13,759
Speaker 1: fake or false or a lie. I just mean that

692
00:39:13,800 --> 00:39:17,200
Speaker 1: we don't know for sure. Other people probably do, but

693
00:39:17,239 --> 00:39:21,480
Speaker 1: I don't. Nineteen sixteen, Tesla declares bankruptcy. He did not

694
00:39:22,360 --> 00:39:26,960
Speaker 1: pasco or collect two hundred dollars y. It was just

695
00:39:27,000 --> 00:39:29,680
Speaker 1: not a good year for him. Uh. In nineteen seventeen,

696
00:39:30,120 --> 00:39:34,480
Speaker 1: he ended up proposing what would depending upon whom you ask,

697
00:39:34,600 --> 00:39:37,880
Speaker 1: Okay people, some people will say in nineteen seventeen, Tesla

698
00:39:37,960 --> 00:39:41,359
Speaker 1: predicted radar radar. Yeah, that he was the guy who

699
00:39:41,400 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 1: came up with radar, but the government turned him down.

700
00:39:45,520 --> 00:39:48,480
Speaker 1: The Navy board said that they would not invest in

701
00:39:48,560 --> 00:39:53,120
Speaker 1: such a technology. By the way, the person from private

702
00:39:53,160 --> 00:39:58,000
Speaker 1: industry who was on the Navy board, well he was

703
00:39:58,239 --> 00:40:01,239
Speaker 1: from from what I understand about the story, Tesla had

704
00:40:01,280 --> 00:40:06,040
Speaker 1: proposed this, this way of finding ships underwater. Yeah, that's

705
00:40:06,080 --> 00:40:08,080
Speaker 1: the problem, right, So the more you look into it,

706
00:40:08,120 --> 00:40:10,479
Speaker 1: the more you realize it's not radar he's talking about,

707
00:40:10,520 --> 00:40:12,239
Speaker 1: not in the sense that we use it today. Well,

708
00:40:12,280 --> 00:40:14,440
Speaker 1: he he was talking about radar, but it was not

709
00:40:14,560 --> 00:40:17,080
Speaker 1: really the best system for finding ships underwater. And so

710
00:40:17,160 --> 00:40:20,400
Speaker 1: therefore when the government from the Navy didn't didn't really

711
00:40:20,440 --> 00:40:23,520
Speaker 1: give him the go ahead, it wasn't because radar is

712
00:40:23,600 --> 00:40:25,840
Speaker 1: dumb or the Tesla's demo was because it wasn't the

713
00:40:25,920 --> 00:40:29,080
Speaker 1: right technology for the application. What Tesla did not take

714
00:40:29,120 --> 00:40:32,640
Speaker 1: into account was he he wanted to use tightly controlled

715
00:40:32,680 --> 00:40:37,080
Speaker 1: electric beams of energy to zap them into the water

716
00:40:37,280 --> 00:40:40,600
Speaker 1: to reflect off the surfaces of submarines, detect that those

717
00:40:40,640 --> 00:40:43,360
Speaker 1: reflections and the information would be displayed back in a

718
00:40:43,400 --> 00:40:46,520
Speaker 1: fluorescent display, which sounds great, except for the problem is

719
00:40:46,560 --> 00:40:49,760
Speaker 1: that these beams would attenuate underwater, and so you would

720
00:40:49,760 --> 00:40:52,759
Speaker 1: not get accurate representations of what you were looking at.

721
00:40:52,760 --> 00:40:56,120
Speaker 1: You wouldn't you couldn't be sure that you know, you

722
00:40:56,160 --> 00:40:58,879
Speaker 1: could be pointing it directly at a submarine and miss

723
00:40:58,920 --> 00:41:01,920
Speaker 1: it because of this attenuate Asian problem. And so it

724
00:41:02,000 --> 00:41:05,120
Speaker 1: just isn't practical for the use that Tesla was suggesting it.

725
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:07,600
Speaker 1: And uh, and so that shows that Tesla had a

726
00:41:07,640 --> 00:41:12,680
Speaker 1: misunderstanding either of the physics of water or the technology itself.

727
00:41:12,719 --> 00:41:15,960
Speaker 1: Either way, it wasn't truly radar. It's not exactly the

728
00:41:16,000 --> 00:41:19,040
Speaker 1: same thing that radar is, and it was not being

729
00:41:19,160 --> 00:41:22,000
Speaker 1: used in the way that radar ultimately would be used.

730
00:41:22,040 --> 00:41:26,600
Speaker 1: So while some people claim that he invented radar as

731
00:41:26,719 --> 00:41:30,600
Speaker 1: being a little generous, nineteen, we just busted a myth,

732
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:32,440
Speaker 1: and I hadn't I apologize because I haven't gotten to

733
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:34,640
Speaker 1: that section yet. But that's okay, that's one less for

734
00:41:34,680 --> 00:41:36,840
Speaker 1: us to worry about when we get there in nineteen

735
00:41:36,920 --> 00:41:39,640
Speaker 1: thirty four. Actually, if if we can, if we can

736
00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:43,800
Speaker 1: step back, just to short, let's please in In nineteen nineteen,

737
00:41:43,840 --> 00:41:48,680
Speaker 1: he published an autobiography called My Inventions Uh that was

738
00:41:48,719 --> 00:41:52,080
Speaker 1: published in six parts in the Electrical Experiment or magazine.

739
00:41:52,400 --> 00:41:55,480
Speaker 1: And this is important because it is one of the

740
00:41:55,520 --> 00:41:59,160
Speaker 1: main sources of information about Tesla's life, which is why

741
00:41:59,719 --> 00:42:01,640
Speaker 1: you have to take everything with a grain of salt,

742
00:42:01,719 --> 00:42:04,160
Speaker 1: because he was a bit of a self promoter. So

743
00:42:04,280 --> 00:42:07,400
Speaker 1: there's not I'm not saying that Tesla was lying in

744
00:42:07,520 --> 00:42:09,560
Speaker 1: his autobiography. What I'm saying is you just have to

745
00:42:09,640 --> 00:42:12,720
Speaker 1: take into consideration the possibility that he may have exaggerated

746
00:42:12,760 --> 00:42:17,600
Speaker 1: some facts, not that he was purposefully trying to mislead people,

747
00:42:17,640 --> 00:42:20,600
Speaker 1: but that when you become a self promoter, that that

748
00:42:20,640 --> 00:42:23,080
Speaker 1: can happen. Even if you don't mean it to happen,

749
00:42:23,120 --> 00:42:24,920
Speaker 1: it can happen, Which is kind of crazy that you're

750
00:42:24,960 --> 00:42:26,560
Speaker 1: just you know, in your mind, you're like, this is

751
00:42:26,600 --> 00:42:29,760
Speaker 1: totally how it happened, and then anyone else is like, dude,

752
00:42:29,920 --> 00:42:34,480
Speaker 1: I was there, and that totally is not how it happened. Um, Jonathan,

753
00:42:34,560 --> 00:42:37,959
Speaker 1: You've never beheaded anyone in the cold blood of a fight.

754
00:42:38,280 --> 00:42:41,319
Speaker 1: On the cold blood of a fight, and The New

755
00:42:41,360 --> 00:42:44,560
Speaker 1: York Times published as an article about Tesla's death, ray,

756
00:42:46,080 --> 00:42:49,040
Speaker 1: Yeah this was. Tesla said that he had come up

757
00:42:49,080 --> 00:42:53,520
Speaker 1: with an idea that would allow governments to build a

758
00:42:54,000 --> 00:42:58,680
Speaker 1: device capable of emitting a beam of energy that could

759
00:42:58,719 --> 00:43:02,040
Speaker 1: bring down a fleet of him thousand enemy planes at

760
00:43:02,040 --> 00:43:05,120
Speaker 1: a distance of two hundred fifty miles, and that his

761
00:43:05,200 --> 00:43:08,200
Speaker 1: idea was that by outfitting pretty much everybody with one

762
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:11,719
Speaker 1: of these, you would have that mutually assured destruction that

763
00:43:11,840 --> 00:43:14,840
Speaker 1: makes peace possible. He actually called it a piece beam

764
00:43:14,920 --> 00:43:17,080
Speaker 1: from what I understand, Yeah, I said that would really

765
00:43:17,200 --> 00:43:19,120
Speaker 1: end war because how could you have war If you

766
00:43:19,160 --> 00:43:23,279
Speaker 1: can't fly over another country without worrying about your entire

767
00:43:23,320 --> 00:43:26,200
Speaker 1: fleet being destroyed, then obviously war is off the table.

768
00:43:26,719 --> 00:43:30,759
Speaker 1: That was kind of his his somewhat naive plan. And

769
00:43:31,680 --> 00:43:34,640
Speaker 1: whether or not this thing would ever work is another

770
00:43:35,080 --> 00:43:38,440
Speaker 1: interesting question, or if there ever was anything beyond just

771
00:43:38,640 --> 00:43:41,000
Speaker 1: this idea that hey, maybe one day I could build

772
00:43:41,040 --> 00:43:44,799
Speaker 1: something that does this. Uh, that's another you know, that's

773
00:43:44,800 --> 00:43:49,080
Speaker 1: another one of those things. It's a myth, right. Uh.

774
00:43:49,200 --> 00:43:51,080
Speaker 1: He decided to go feed the pigeons in the park,

775
00:43:51,200 --> 00:43:54,640
Speaker 1: which was a bad decision to make that particular day,

776
00:43:55,000 --> 00:43:57,640
Speaker 1: as as he was crossing the street, he was struck

777
00:43:57,640 --> 00:44:02,120
Speaker 1: by a cab. Then to in upon which report you read,

778
00:44:02,320 --> 00:44:04,680
Speaker 1: he flew thirty five to forty ft in the air

779
00:44:04,680 --> 00:44:08,400
Speaker 1: and landed and was perfectly unharmed except a little bruised

780
00:44:08,920 --> 00:44:11,040
Speaker 1: or he had broken several ribs. It all depends on

781
00:44:11,080 --> 00:44:14,680
Speaker 1: which person you're asking. Tesla said, damn, I'm all right.

782
00:44:14,840 --> 00:44:18,080
Speaker 1: Other people like dude, he was messed up. He was

783
00:44:18,120 --> 00:44:22,000
Speaker 1: crying about his pigeons. It was ugly. He he had

784
00:44:22,040 --> 00:44:24,279
Speaker 1: he had at this point become a little bit destitute.

785
00:44:24,440 --> 00:44:27,400
Speaker 1: Um he due to all of these various financial troubles

786
00:44:27,400 --> 00:44:31,480
Speaker 1: over the years, and and basic misspending. I think head, yeah, didn't. Yeah,

787
00:44:31,719 --> 00:44:34,600
Speaker 1: there were a lot of hotels that were suing him

788
00:44:34,640 --> 00:44:37,759
Speaker 1: because he had lived inside the hotel for years and

789
00:44:37,840 --> 00:44:40,880
Speaker 1: years and owed them thousands of dollars, and then he

790
00:44:40,880 --> 00:44:43,319
Speaker 1: would relocate to a different hotel, and you think, like,

791
00:44:43,360 --> 00:44:46,800
Speaker 1: why would another hotel even trust him? He was Tesla Again,

792
00:44:46,880 --> 00:44:50,000
Speaker 1: this is a rock star guy, and it elevates the

793
00:44:50,080 --> 00:44:53,600
Speaker 1: status of your hotel that he's staying there. But you

794
00:44:53,640 --> 00:44:56,640
Speaker 1: can only have Lindsay Lohan in your hotel for so

795
00:44:56,680 --> 00:44:59,920
Speaker 1: long before you're like, seriously, could you please stop making

796
00:45:00,040 --> 00:45:03,160
Speaker 1: holes in the growing TVs out the window? Guys, I

797
00:45:03,160 --> 00:45:05,440
Speaker 1: am sitting across from the from the person who had

798
00:45:05,480 --> 00:45:08,600
Speaker 1: just compared Nicola Tesla to Lindsay Lohan. I think it's

799
00:45:08,600 --> 00:45:11,799
Speaker 1: an apt comparison. Look, Lindsay Lohan hasn't reached the age

800
00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:15,560
Speaker 1: Tesla was at when he started to really uh contribute

801
00:45:15,560 --> 00:45:17,879
Speaker 1: to humanity. So I think we owe her a year

802
00:45:17,920 --> 00:45:20,160
Speaker 1: or two. I'm just saying that if anyone actually figures

803
00:45:20,160 --> 00:45:22,880
Speaker 1: out Tesla's particle beam and aims it at the HW

804
00:45:22,920 --> 00:45:25,000
Speaker 1: office is and just just just just let me know

805
00:45:25,280 --> 00:45:29,360
Speaker 1: I'm perfectly willing to give you Jonathan g a syncritis coordinates.

806
00:45:29,360 --> 00:45:32,320
Speaker 1: Please keep in mind that stuff you missed in history class,

807
00:45:32,400 --> 00:45:34,880
Speaker 1: and stuff mom never told you sit really near me.

808
00:45:35,680 --> 00:45:39,480
Speaker 1: So if you love those shows, keep your beam particle

809
00:45:39,640 --> 00:45:43,759
Speaker 1: pointed somewhere else. That's not cool. We'll be right back

810
00:45:43,800 --> 00:45:48,880
Speaker 1: to talk more about Nicola Tesla, an eccentric inventor and

811
00:45:49,120 --> 00:45:52,040
Speaker 1: lover of alternating current in just a moment after this

812
00:45:52,120 --> 00:46:03,319
Speaker 1: quick break. January seven three was a bad day for

813
00:46:03,400 --> 00:46:06,200
Speaker 1: Tesla because that's the day he passed on. He was

814
00:46:06,320 --> 00:46:10,439
Speaker 1: eighty six years old. Uh and two days later, all

815
00:46:10,440 --> 00:46:14,280
Speaker 1: of his papers and a state was seized by the government.

816
00:46:14,560 --> 00:46:17,000
Speaker 1: Well some some stories say that his nephew showed up

817
00:46:17,200 --> 00:46:19,080
Speaker 1: the morning after he passed away, and that his body

818
00:46:19,080 --> 00:46:21,319
Speaker 1: had already been removed, and that the nephew noticed that

819
00:46:21,400 --> 00:46:23,880
Speaker 1: it seemed like some of his papers were missing. Yeah,

820
00:46:24,080 --> 00:46:26,600
Speaker 1: this is where one of those stories pops up. In fact,

821
00:46:26,719 --> 00:46:30,160
Speaker 1: now that we've had Tesla shuffle off the mortal and

822
00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:33,719
Speaker 1: Tesla coil, thank you, I've been waiting to use that one,

823
00:46:34,600 --> 00:46:36,680
Speaker 1: we can talk a little bit about this this idea.

824
00:46:36,760 --> 00:46:38,120
Speaker 1: So there are a lot of rumors out there. One

825
00:46:38,120 --> 00:46:42,000
Speaker 1: of the big rumors is that the FBI seized all

826
00:46:42,160 --> 00:46:46,440
Speaker 1: of Tesla's papers and did so in an effort to

827
00:46:47,239 --> 00:46:50,839
Speaker 1: to use them for various nefarious purposes for the United

828
00:46:50,880 --> 00:46:55,720
Speaker 1: States government. Now keep in mind this is nte. World

829
00:46:55,760 --> 00:46:59,480
Speaker 1: War two is a thing, and so there is a

830
00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:04,080
Speaker 1: genuine concerned that information that has scientific significance could fall

831
00:47:04,120 --> 00:47:09,359
Speaker 1: into the hands of other nations and give give other

832
00:47:09,640 --> 00:47:13,320
Speaker 1: other nations a lot of advantages over the United States.

833
00:47:13,320 --> 00:47:16,239
Speaker 1: And so it was very important to guard whatever advantages

834
00:47:16,280 --> 00:47:18,880
Speaker 1: you had against that absolutely. And also I mean remember

835
00:47:18,880 --> 00:47:22,040
Speaker 1: that that Tesla was a Serbian American um as as such,

836
00:47:22,120 --> 00:47:26,360
Speaker 1: the from from from what we can discern, of fact,

837
00:47:26,400 --> 00:47:29,320
Speaker 1: it was actually the Department of Justice Alien Property Custodian

838
00:47:29,360 --> 00:47:32,480
Speaker 1: Office that temporarily seized his papers, right, so it was

839
00:47:32,520 --> 00:47:34,640
Speaker 1: not the FBI. It was a Department of Justice and

840
00:47:34,680 --> 00:47:37,040
Speaker 1: the FBI. Still they've got like a like a top

841
00:47:37,080 --> 00:47:40,160
Speaker 1: ten myths on on the internet. Number ten. Number ten

842
00:47:40,280 --> 00:47:43,359
Speaker 1: is is that we took Tesla's papers like guys, Like guys,

843
00:47:43,400 --> 00:47:46,400
Speaker 1: we didn't. We did for real, Zo, we didn't grab

844
00:47:46,440 --> 00:47:49,280
Speaker 1: those And actually I looked into it and it wouldn't

845
00:47:49,280 --> 00:47:52,279
Speaker 1: be until well, you know, if you read most of

846
00:47:52,280 --> 00:47:53,920
Speaker 1: the stories. It's like the FBI took the papers and

847
00:47:53,920 --> 00:47:56,120
Speaker 1: they never released them, and we want, we demand that

848
00:47:56,120 --> 00:47:58,600
Speaker 1: these papers be released. Guys. It was the Department of

849
00:47:58,600 --> 00:48:00,960
Speaker 1: Justice number one and number two in nineteen fifty two

850
00:48:00,960 --> 00:48:04,640
Speaker 1: they sent the papers to uh to Kasanovich, his nephew,

851
00:48:04,840 --> 00:48:07,680
Speaker 1: and that is that is nine years later. Yeah, alright,

852
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:10,319
Speaker 1: granted nine years. Like we're a talking about time during

853
00:48:10,360 --> 00:48:12,080
Speaker 1: not just the World War two with the Red Scared

854
00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:16,879
Speaker 1: as well, So I mean not that that justifies suppressing information. Also,

855
00:48:16,880 --> 00:48:19,680
Speaker 1: you're talking about the government, So it may very well

856
00:48:19,719 --> 00:48:24,120
Speaker 1: be that there wasn't any intentional um slowness on the

857
00:48:24,120 --> 00:48:27,959
Speaker 1: part of the government. That's just the way the government works.

858
00:48:28,080 --> 00:48:30,279
Speaker 1: But I don't know, I honestly don't know. What I

859
00:48:30,320 --> 00:48:32,480
Speaker 1: do know is they did release the estate and the

860
00:48:32,520 --> 00:48:35,879
Speaker 1: papers to Yugoslavia, to to his nephew. That they wound

861
00:48:35,960 --> 00:48:39,120
Speaker 1: up in a in a museum. So if you wanted,

862
00:48:39,560 --> 00:48:41,319
Speaker 1: if you're one of the people demanding that there's a

863
00:48:41,320 --> 00:48:43,719
Speaker 1: Tesla museum, good news there is. You just have to

864
00:48:43,760 --> 00:48:47,319
Speaker 1: go to Europe to see it. Also, supposedly after World

865
00:48:47,360 --> 00:48:50,000
Speaker 1: War two was over, copies of his papers were sent

866
00:48:50,080 --> 00:48:53,080
Speaker 1: out to one of the Air Force spaces and Project

867
00:48:53,160 --> 00:48:56,279
Speaker 1: Nick was a thing that was heavily funded, and then

868
00:48:56,320 --> 00:48:58,600
Speaker 1: the papers disappeared, never to be seen again. Yeah, their

869
00:48:58,640 --> 00:49:01,440
Speaker 1: love conspiracy theories here, they're there was one one person

870
00:49:01,520 --> 00:49:03,239
Speaker 1: posted on Facebook when I mentioned that we were going

871
00:49:03,280 --> 00:49:05,120
Speaker 1: to be covering Tesla today, So are you going to

872
00:49:05,200 --> 00:49:07,200
Speaker 1: talk about how they used a lot of his work

873
00:49:07,200 --> 00:49:09,279
Speaker 1: in the developments of stuff in Area fifty one? And

874
00:49:09,280 --> 00:49:11,520
Speaker 1: the answer to that is no, because there's no real

875
00:49:11,560 --> 00:49:14,600
Speaker 1: documentation of that. There's actually quite a bit of information

876
00:49:14,600 --> 00:49:16,640
Speaker 1: about what went on at Area fifty one. It's stuff

877
00:49:16,719 --> 00:49:20,319
Speaker 1: that was top secret at the time. But um, we'll

878
00:49:20,360 --> 00:49:22,160
Speaker 1: have to do an episode all about Area fifty one

879
00:49:22,200 --> 00:49:24,720
Speaker 1: sometime in the future, just because it's a fascinating topic.

880
00:49:25,239 --> 00:49:27,880
Speaker 1: But it's all about, you know, developing things like stealth

881
00:49:27,920 --> 00:49:33,200
Speaker 1: technology and various kinds of test uh prototypes for the

882
00:49:33,239 --> 00:49:36,560
Speaker 1: Air Force or for the army. But but nothing like

883
00:49:36,680 --> 00:49:39,600
Speaker 1: the Tesla death ray, at least nothing that shows up

884
00:49:39,640 --> 00:49:42,160
Speaker 1: in any real record. And I would argue that the

885
00:49:42,160 --> 00:49:43,640
Speaker 1: reason why it doesn't show up on a real record

886
00:49:43,719 --> 00:49:46,200
Speaker 1: is probably because it didn't exist. Um that my second

887
00:49:46,280 --> 00:49:48,080
Speaker 1: choice would be it didn't work, and so there was

888
00:49:48,160 --> 00:49:51,840
Speaker 1: no point in more valut. I don't think we would

889
00:49:51,920 --> 00:49:54,840
Speaker 1: still be debating whether or not exists if it actually

890
00:49:54,880 --> 00:49:57,840
Speaker 1: did exist, because someone would have come forward by now probably,

891
00:49:58,040 --> 00:50:00,120
Speaker 1: or it would have zapped somebody. Although there there is

892
00:50:00,280 --> 00:50:01,839
Speaker 1: stuff they don't want you to know. Did I did

893
00:50:01,840 --> 00:50:04,120
Speaker 1: an episode a couple of years ago on this even

894
00:50:04,239 --> 00:50:06,839
Speaker 1: You can go check that out on YouTube. That's it,

895
00:50:07,600 --> 00:50:11,880
Speaker 1: oh bolan uh. Then also there here's some other myths

896
00:50:11,880 --> 00:50:15,399
Speaker 1: that Tesla invented alternating current. He did not. He did not.

897
00:50:15,800 --> 00:50:20,000
Speaker 1: He alternating current was already a thing in Europe by

898
00:50:20,040 --> 00:50:22,960
Speaker 1: the time Tesla was born. It wasn't widespread, it wasn't

899
00:50:23,000 --> 00:50:24,839
Speaker 1: like there was a huge power grid in Europe, but

900
00:50:25,200 --> 00:50:27,760
Speaker 1: there were people working on alternating current and even working

901
00:50:27,800 --> 00:50:32,120
Speaker 1: on things like induction motors and transformers at that time.

902
00:50:32,360 --> 00:50:36,040
Speaker 1: And so Tesla even studied alternating current when he was

903
00:50:36,080 --> 00:50:40,840
Speaker 1: in school. So it's not something that he invented. He did, however,

904
00:50:41,040 --> 00:50:45,600
Speaker 1: take the knowledge that was being generated around alternating current

905
00:50:45,920 --> 00:50:48,560
Speaker 1: and applied it and furthered it. So it's not it's

906
00:50:48,560 --> 00:50:51,319
Speaker 1: not that he just copied someone else's work. He really

907
00:50:51,360 --> 00:50:54,600
Speaker 1: did make legitimate contributions, I'm sure, and it was it

908
00:50:54,640 --> 00:50:57,400
Speaker 1: was his patents in his his work with Westinghouse that

909
00:50:57,680 --> 00:51:01,600
Speaker 1: led to alternating current, the coming the thing that the

910
00:51:01,680 --> 00:51:05,440
Speaker 1: US uses and and the thing that is capable of

911
00:51:05,440 --> 00:51:08,440
Speaker 1: going across long distances. Both of those are extremely extremely important.

912
00:51:08,800 --> 00:51:11,359
Speaker 1: I can't downplay either of those exactly. Yes, but but

913
00:51:11,600 --> 00:51:13,560
Speaker 1: you know, he did not invent it. He didn't invent it.

914
00:51:13,560 --> 00:51:17,200
Speaker 1: He's not the reason why it's what's being used in Europe. Uh.

915
00:51:17,239 --> 00:51:19,799
Speaker 1: So that's one thing we can kind of put to bed.

916
00:51:20,320 --> 00:51:24,400
Speaker 1: And in fact, the first work with alternating current dates

917
00:51:24,440 --> 00:51:28,800
Speaker 1: back to five, which was, you know, twenty years before

918
00:51:28,840 --> 00:51:32,920
Speaker 1: Tesla was born. So unless he also invented time travel,

919
00:51:33,760 --> 00:51:37,600
Speaker 1: and don't write me and tell me he did, that's

920
00:51:37,640 --> 00:51:40,480
Speaker 1: not that's not the case. Um, like I would believe

921
00:51:40,480 --> 00:51:45,800
Speaker 1: anything after watching The Prestige again another documentary, right, Uh.

922
00:51:46,200 --> 00:51:48,880
Speaker 1: Beyond that, a Westinghouse, like we pointed out, was working

923
00:51:48,960 --> 00:51:53,000
Speaker 1: on UH distribution grids designs for a C power and

924
00:51:53,160 --> 00:51:57,120
Speaker 1: transformers before Tesla had even started to work for the company. Now,

925
00:51:57,160 --> 00:52:00,120
Speaker 1: granted again, Tesla's patents and the information that he was

926
00:52:00,160 --> 00:52:03,439
Speaker 1: able to provide to Westinghouse ended up making those much

927
00:52:03,520 --> 00:52:06,520
Speaker 1: more robust and it made it possible to actually act

928
00:52:06,560 --> 00:52:09,480
Speaker 1: on that. But again, it shows that he's not the

929
00:52:09,520 --> 00:52:13,080
Speaker 1: only one working on this at the time. Um. He's

930
00:52:13,120 --> 00:52:15,520
Speaker 1: also not the guy who invented transformers. Those were first

931
00:52:15,560 --> 00:52:18,960
Speaker 1: being used in Budapest in the eighteen seventies. Uh, and

932
00:52:19,000 --> 00:52:21,800
Speaker 1: the very first modern transformer was built by William Stanley

933
00:52:21,840 --> 00:52:26,080
Speaker 1: in eighty five. He did not invent the fluorescent lamp.

934
00:52:26,760 --> 00:52:32,560
Speaker 1: Alexandra Beccarell was the first guy to to observe fluorescence,

935
00:52:32,600 --> 00:52:35,200
Speaker 1: and he did so in eighteen fifty seven when Tesla

936
00:52:35,320 --> 00:52:39,400
Speaker 1: was one. So again, unless Tesla was also observing fluorescence

937
00:52:39,440 --> 00:52:40,879
Speaker 1: at one year old, and maybe he was. I mean

938
00:52:40,880 --> 00:52:43,279
Speaker 1: he was born in a storm after all. Thor was

939
00:52:43,360 --> 00:52:47,319
Speaker 1: his buddy. Um, you can't say that he invented that.

940
00:52:47,440 --> 00:52:52,239
Speaker 1: He did not discover X rays. I've as we covered before. Yeah,

941
00:52:52,239 --> 00:52:55,320
Speaker 1: Ivan Poolui, I have no idea how to say his

942
00:52:55,400 --> 00:52:57,680
Speaker 1: last name. I know I just butchered it. But but Ivan,

943
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:02,680
Speaker 1: my buddy Ivan. He he had actually observed the phenomena

944
00:53:02,719 --> 00:53:06,320
Speaker 1: of X rays before Tesla had. But just like Tesla,

945
00:53:06,400 --> 00:53:08,560
Speaker 1: he wasn't really sure what it was he was looking at.

946
00:53:08,600 --> 00:53:11,359
Speaker 1: He thought it was interesting, but he wasn't really sure

947
00:53:11,600 --> 00:53:14,160
Speaker 1: about you know, what this stuff actually is. It wouldn't

948
00:53:14,160 --> 00:53:17,440
Speaker 1: be until Wilhelm Ronin really looked into it and began

949
00:53:17,480 --> 00:53:21,439
Speaker 1: to make theories and hypotheses and tests some really clever

950
00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:23,640
Speaker 1: things about them. That's that's when we started to know

951
00:53:23,719 --> 00:53:26,920
Speaker 1: that what they were. But other other scientists had been

952
00:53:26,960 --> 00:53:31,120
Speaker 1: observing it, they just didn't understand it. Again, we talked

953
00:53:31,120 --> 00:53:33,319
Speaker 1: about the radar thing, and we talked about FBI. So

954
00:53:33,400 --> 00:53:36,279
Speaker 1: those are the big myths. Other myths are you know,

955
00:53:36,320 --> 00:53:39,840
Speaker 1: the whole Testla versus Edison thing. Uh, it was really

956
00:53:39,920 --> 00:53:45,800
Speaker 1: more Edison companies versus Westinghouse companies and not so much

957
00:53:45,880 --> 00:53:49,080
Speaker 1: a personality thing. Well, it does sound like the two

958
00:53:49,080 --> 00:53:51,760
Speaker 1: of them clashed. There are a whole bunch of reports

959
00:53:51,800 --> 00:53:53,600
Speaker 1: about how I mean, right from the get go they

960
00:53:53,600 --> 00:53:55,759
Speaker 1: didn't really like each other, right, um and and it's

961
00:53:55,760 --> 00:53:58,840
Speaker 1: easy to see, you know, they were both very strong personalities,

962
00:53:59,080 --> 00:54:02,359
Speaker 1: um and very big showman and it didn't it doesn't

963
00:54:02,360 --> 00:54:04,720
Speaker 1: sound like either of them really liked not that anyone

964
00:54:04,800 --> 00:54:07,239
Speaker 1: likes it, but but to be made a fool of.

965
00:54:07,560 --> 00:54:09,600
Speaker 1: And both of them were in the business of, in fact,

966
00:54:09,600 --> 00:54:11,839
Speaker 1: trying to make a full of the other person. So yeah,

967
00:54:11,880 --> 00:54:13,799
Speaker 1: there was some of that. There was some showmanship, There

968
00:54:13,880 --> 00:54:16,080
Speaker 1: was some there's some and and I mean there was

969
00:54:16,560 --> 00:54:19,320
Speaker 1: clearly some sort of legitimate beef between us and Tesla,

970
00:54:19,360 --> 00:54:21,759
Speaker 1: at least as far as you know, Tesla getting the

971
00:54:21,760 --> 00:54:24,120
Speaker 1: credit that he wanted and Tesla, you know, a lot

972
00:54:24,120 --> 00:54:28,879
Speaker 1: of his fortunes switched mainly because he made some really

973
00:54:28,920 --> 00:54:34,160
Speaker 1: bad business deals. He sold patents off out a pittance

974
00:54:34,719 --> 00:54:37,400
Speaker 1: at times, because the company would come to him and say,

975
00:54:38,080 --> 00:54:42,640
Speaker 1: you know, there's this massive economic downturn coming. We need

976
00:54:42,680 --> 00:54:46,360
Speaker 1: this these patents, but if we paid you what they're worth,

977
00:54:46,400 --> 00:54:49,000
Speaker 1: then we're going to go under. And Contessa is like, look,

978
00:54:49,040 --> 00:54:51,640
Speaker 1: I'll cut you a deal. Yeah. They were basically kind

979
00:54:51,640 --> 00:54:52,880
Speaker 1: of like, can we give you a tenth of the

980
00:54:52,920 --> 00:54:54,359
Speaker 1: fee that we're going to promise you and then give

981
00:54:54,400 --> 00:54:57,279
Speaker 1: you some stock right before a terrible economic downturn. And

982
00:54:57,320 --> 00:55:00,600
Speaker 1: Tesla was like, yes, is good, give me that, and

983
00:55:00,600 --> 00:55:04,920
Speaker 1: and and and the famous Westinghouse deal where um uh.

984
00:55:05,040 --> 00:55:08,160
Speaker 1: Even even even though a Westinghouse won the so called

985
00:55:08,160 --> 00:55:11,120
Speaker 1: War of the Currents, the company was not doing well

986
00:55:11,160 --> 00:55:14,440
Speaker 1: and and wound up after they had built the generator

987
00:55:14,480 --> 00:55:18,360
Speaker 1: at Niagara, I think started to go under and there

988
00:55:18,400 --> 00:55:22,320
Speaker 1: were some issues with mostly it was just again just

989
00:55:22,320 --> 00:55:26,360
Speaker 1: just poor decisions on Tesla's part um test the let

990
00:55:26,400 --> 00:55:28,759
Speaker 1: him out of the contract just to he said said like, oh, no,

991
00:55:28,840 --> 00:55:30,200
Speaker 1: you don't have to pay me the rest. That's fine,

992
00:55:30,200 --> 00:55:32,839
Speaker 1: you save your company. Yeah, which is which is great.

993
00:55:32,840 --> 00:55:34,520
Speaker 1: I mean, it's lovely, it's a nice it's a terrific

994
00:55:34,560 --> 00:55:35,920
Speaker 1: I mean, but you know, it's it's when you when

995
00:55:35,960 --> 00:55:37,719
Speaker 1: you end up having no friends other than pigeons and

996
00:55:37,760 --> 00:55:42,280
Speaker 1: owing every hotel in New York money. Maybe that's why. Yeah, yeah,

997
00:55:42,320 --> 00:55:45,440
Speaker 1: that could that could be one of the factors. Um

998
00:55:45,600 --> 00:55:48,359
Speaker 1: he certainly, And I know that people are probably listening

999
00:55:48,400 --> 00:55:50,759
Speaker 1: to this episode and thinking that I am. I think

1000
00:55:50,800 --> 00:55:54,520
Speaker 1: Tesla was a worthless lay about that. Nothing could be

1001
00:55:54,560 --> 00:55:56,799
Speaker 1: further from the truth. I think he really did make

1002
00:55:57,440 --> 00:56:01,800
Speaker 1: incredible contributions to to the success of the United States

1003
00:56:01,800 --> 00:56:05,440
Speaker 1: in general and to several technologies around the world in particular.

1004
00:56:05,920 --> 00:56:10,759
Speaker 1: But it's also important not to overstate his contributions and

1005
00:56:10,840 --> 00:56:14,240
Speaker 1: to understand, especially at the expense of other very important

1006
00:56:14,360 --> 00:56:18,480
Speaker 1: inventors and minds and works, it's a disservice to everyone

1007
00:56:18,600 --> 00:56:20,920
Speaker 1: else who worked on these same things and helped make

1008
00:56:20,960 --> 00:56:25,800
Speaker 1: them a possible a reality really in our lives, and

1009
00:56:25,800 --> 00:56:28,360
Speaker 1: and you know, you've got to also pay attention to

1010
00:56:28,400 --> 00:56:30,719
Speaker 1: some of the crazier ideas like the death ray, the

1011
00:56:30,760 --> 00:56:33,760
Speaker 1: death raying, Yeah, or being able to move the entire

1012
00:56:33,840 --> 00:56:37,160
Speaker 1: earth with putting essentially a wire around it and tapping

1013
00:56:37,160 --> 00:56:40,680
Speaker 1: into the frequency that it generates, which, hey, maybe that

1014
00:56:40,800 --> 00:56:43,880
Speaker 1: is possible, it's just not practical, right, Yeah, that's and

1015
00:56:43,880 --> 00:56:45,120
Speaker 1: I think that that's a problem with a lot of

1016
00:56:45,160 --> 00:56:49,000
Speaker 1: his latter theories is they were not particularly practical. Yeah, yeah,

1017
00:56:49,200 --> 00:56:51,160
Speaker 1: so he was also, I mean, there there's stories about

1018
00:56:51,239 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 1: him having a couple of nervous breakdowns at various times

1019
00:56:53,600 --> 00:56:57,640
Speaker 1: in his life. I think that he was probably not

1020
00:56:57,680 --> 00:57:01,640
Speaker 1: necessarily mentally well for a deal of his existence. I agree,

1021
00:57:01,800 --> 00:57:04,080
Speaker 1: I agree. I think he probably had quite a few

1022
00:57:04,880 --> 00:57:07,560
Speaker 1: uh issues to work through, and that I mean, you know,

1023
00:57:07,560 --> 00:57:09,960
Speaker 1: I can, considering how well we treat those kind of

1024
00:57:09,960 --> 00:57:11,840
Speaker 1: people today, it is easy to see how at the

1025
00:57:11,840 --> 00:57:14,400
Speaker 1: turn of the century he was not particularly given the

1026
00:57:14,440 --> 00:57:18,040
Speaker 1: chances that he needed. And Ladies and gentlemen, that wraps

1027
00:57:18,120 --> 00:57:22,640
Speaker 1: up our conversation are our our classic episode of tech

1028
00:57:22,720 --> 00:57:25,880
Speaker 1: stuff about Nicola Tesla, And believe it or not, I

1029
00:57:25,920 --> 00:57:30,680
Speaker 1: really admire Tesla a lot. I mean, truly was a

1030
00:57:30,840 --> 00:57:35,720
Speaker 1: genius a true genius and someone who had been wronged

1031
00:57:36,320 --> 00:57:39,520
Speaker 1: quite a bit throughout his life. But that being said,

1032
00:57:39,560 --> 00:57:44,680
Speaker 1: I don't necessarily think everything he thought of was absolutely brilliant.

1033
00:57:44,720 --> 00:57:47,880
Speaker 1: I don't go quite that far. So uh. I hope

1034
00:57:47,920 --> 00:57:50,680
Speaker 1: you guys enjoyed this classic episode. If you have any

1035
00:57:50,680 --> 00:57:54,000
Speaker 1: suggestions for future topics for tech Stuff, send me a

1036
00:57:54,040 --> 00:57:56,720
Speaker 1: message on social media. You can find me on Facebook

1037
00:57:57,000 --> 00:58:00,080
Speaker 1: or on Twitter with the handled text stuff. HS with

1038
00:58:00,200 --> 00:58:07,520
Speaker 1: you and I'll talk to you again really soon. Text

1039
00:58:07,520 --> 00:58:10,200
Speaker 1: Stuff is a production of I Heart Radio's How Stuff Works.

1040
00:58:10,360 --> 00:58:13,160
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the I

1041
00:58:13,280 --> 00:58:16,520
Speaker 1: heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to

1042
00:58:16,560 --> 00:58:17,480
Speaker 1: your favorite shows.