Description
Nikola Tesla began his scientific journey long before leaving for America. A restless spirit and a desire for education led the young Nikola through European academic centres in Graz, Prague, Budapest and Paris, where he gained an education in electrical engineering studies as well as experience in improving electronic equipment.
Two years of study at the Polytechnic Academy in Graz, which was then a meeting place of scientific thought and artistic activity of people from all the countries of Southeast Europe, then studies and research work at the Technical University in Prague, recommended the young engineer Nikola Tesla for the job of chief technician of the American Telephone Company, first in Budapest, and then in Paris. His stay in Budapest resulted in the invention of the telephone sound amplifier. As an engineer for the Edison Company in Paris, he installed an Edison switchboard in Strasbourg that uses the principle of a rotating magnetic field of alternating currents.
In June 1844, Tesla boarded the steamship «City of Richmond» bound for New York. The education and experience he brought from Europe recommended him for a job as an engineer in Edison’s company «Edison Machines» where he was supposed to work on the redesign of direct current generators. Progressive scientific ideas and innate engineering curiosity led Tesla to establish his own company «Tesla Electric Lighting and Production» in 1866, thus paving the way for the genius from Smiljan to prepare humanity for the 21st century with his scientific activity and inventive work.
Nikola Tesla, Serbian by origin, European by education, realized his full potential and engineering genius as a resident of the USA, and he bequeathed his great scientific work to all of humanity, thus demonstrating that scientific thought and progress do not know and do not recognize borders.
Expert collaboration: ”Svetozar Marković” University Library, Belgrade
Artistic realization of the issue: Boban Savić MA, academic painter
