Who lived life eccentrically and did whatever the hell they wanted whilst being a madman? Nikola Tesla, the Russian genius who happened to be medically classed crazy.
Born in 1856 in what is now Croatia, at a young age he could memorise calculus and recite entire books. He wanted to be an engineer when he grew up but his father, who was a priest, wanted him to be a priest. At 18 Nikola contracted cholera. On his deathbed he said to his father "I'll try not to do if you send me to Engineering school." As you can guess, being on his deathbed and all, his father agreed. I shit you not he made a miraculous recovery, and in 1884 Tesla went to New York to start with only 4 cents and a letter of recommendation addressed to none other than Thosmas Eddison. When he arrived he noticed that everyone was using incandescent lights powered by Eddison's DC (Direct Current). Because DC is a direct current that loses voltage and power over long distances, Eddison was building power plants every 2 miles along the Eastern Seaboard. With all these powerlines New Yorkers were frying all over the place.
With all of this in mind, Tesla put forward his theory of AC (Alternating Current) to Eddison. AC works by periodically reversing the current of electricity, thus continually stepping up the voltage, allowing the electricity to travel further without losing energy. Eddison told Tesla that he would pay him $50,000 if Tesla could build him a fully functioning motor that is safer than DC. A few months later Tesla came back with a fully functional Induction Motor that ran on AC power. When Tesla asked for his money, Eddison then told him that he was joking. After that Tesla and Eddison became life-long enemies, hating each so much that when they were nominated to both recieve a Nobel prize together Tesla said he wouldn't accept it if Eddison was there.
Figure 1 - DC current vs an AC current
In the end Tesla won the DC versus AC war, where he proceeded to sell his patent to George Westinghouse for $60,000 and they went on to make the first hydro-electric powerplant using Tesla's technology. After this happened Tesla had a compulsion to start transmitting electricity wirelessly. This is about the time when he invented what is known as the Tesla Coil. This is also when he discovered shortly thereafter that he could recieve and transmit radio signals if they resonated at the same frequency. With wireless technology he also invented wireless toys, like boats and cars and what not.
Figure 2 - A fully functional, modern Tesla Coil
In 1899 he went out to Colorado to experiment on wireless energy transmission. He used scrap metal to invent a machine which could do this, and reportedly powered 200 lightbulbs from a power source from 26 Miles away. Where are the plans for such a device? Locked away in his head. He very rarely wrote down his findings and rarely drafted any plans for his devices. To put this into perspective a group of scientists back in 2007 managed to wirelessly transmit energy over a span of 7 feet through the air. In 1900 he was approached by J.P. Morgan to build a massive fancied up version of his device to provide the world with free power, all from a wireless tesla coil. When the stock market crashed and he was asking for more and more money, the project was cancelled.
As a result, he suffered from a nervous breakdown, and as a result, he went crazy. He rescued pigeons and spoke of one particular pigeon rather fondly to a biographer, saying that "He loved it like a man would love a woman." After this the world started to ignore him.
He passed away with 700 patents under his belt and the world knowing him as that one crazy super genius. So yeah, essentially he is the grandfather of all of our modern energy. What a legend.
Sources:
1. Nikola Tesla: Great Minds - Scishowhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPnGvjmIgZA
2. Nikola Tesla - Wikipedia*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla
3. Tesla's Biography - Tesla Memorial Society of New Yorkhttp://www.teslasociety.com/biography.htm
4. Electrical pioneer Tesla Honoured - BBC Newshttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5167054.stm
*Note: If using Wikipedia, remember to look at the reference list like I did, you get more accurate information that way.
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