EXPERIMENTS ALTERNATE CURRENTS HIGH POTENTIAL AND HIGH FREQUENCY. A LECTURE DELIVERED BEFORE THE INSTITUTION OF ELECTRIOAL ENGINEERS, LONDON. NIKOLA TESLA. WITH AN APPENDIC BY THE SAME AUTHOR TRANSMISSION OF LECTRC ENERGY ‘WITHOUT WIRES, Revers oer Wome ao Passer unmtaons Wun « Noe orirat ond o Digraphiel Such ef the Avon, Fredonia Books Amsterdam, The NetherlandsExperiments with Altemate Curents Potenial and High Frequency by Nikola Tesla ISBN: 1-58963.903.6 Copyright © 2002 by Fredonia Books Reprinted from the riginal eddon Fredonia Books ‘Amsterdam, The Netherlands Inup:/Awwwefredoniabooks com llrightsreserved, including the right o reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form, Inorder to make original editions of histrial works available to scholarsat an economical price, this, facsimile ofthe original exition isreproduced from, the best available copy and has been digitally ‘enhanced to improve legibility, bu the text remains ‘altered to retain historical authenticity Biographical Sketch of Nikola Tesla. ‘While a largo portion of the European family has been surgmg westward during the last three or four hundred year, settling the vast continents of America, another, but smaller, portion has been doing frontier work in the Old World, protooting tho rear by beating back the “unspeak- able Turk” and reclatiaing gradually the fair lands that endure the curse of Mohammedan rule, For a long time the Slav poople—who, after the battle of Kosovopjolje, in ‘which the Turks dofoated the Servians, retired to the con- fines of the prusent Montenegro, Dalmatia, Herzegovina fand Bosnia, and “Borderland” of Aetria—tnew what it ‘was to deal, as our Western pioneers did, with foes cease- lesely fretting aguinatthoirfronticr 5 and the races of these ‘countries, through thoir strenuous struggle against the ‘armios of the Creseent, have developed notable qualities of bravery and sagacity, while maintaining « petriotism and independenco unsurpassed in any other nation. ‘Tt-was in this intaresting border region, and from among theee valiant Eartera folk, that Nikola Tesla was born in the year 1857, and the fact that ho, to-day, finds himselt in America and one of our foremost eloctrcians, is striking teridence of the extraordinary attractiveness alike of eleo- trical parmita and of the country where electricity enjoys ite widest application,v Mr. Teala's native place was Smiljan, Lika, where his father was an eloquent clergyman of the Gresk Church, {in which, by the way, his family is till prominently repre- sented. Tis mother enjoyed great fame throaghout the countryside for her skill and originality in needlework, and doubtless transmitted heringenuity to Nikola; though itmaturally took another and more masculine direction. ‘Tho boy was erly putto his books, and upon his father removal to Goapic he spent four years in the pablie school, and later, three years in the Real School, as it is called. His escapades were such at most quickwitted boys go through, althongh he varied the programme on one oc casion by getting imprisoned in a remote mountain chapel rarely visited for service; and on another oceasion by fall- ing headlong into a huge kettle of boiling milk, just drawn from the paternal herds. A third ourious episode was that connected with his efforts to fly when, attempting to navigate the air with the aidof an old umbrella, be had, as might be expected, a very bad fall, and was laid up for six weeks ‘About this period he began to take delight in arithmetic fand physics. One quoer notion he had was to work out everything by three or the power of three. He was now sent to an aunt at Uartstat, Croatia, to finish his studies in what is known as the Higher Real School. Tt was there that, coming from the roral fastnestes, he saw a steam en sive for the first time with a ploarure that he remembers tothis day. At Cartatt ho wasso diligent as to compress the four year?’ course into three, and graduated in 1878, Returning home during an epidemic of cholera, he was Y stricken down by the disease and suffered so seriously from the consequences that his studies were interrapted for fully twoyears, But the time was not wasted, for he had be- ‘come passionately fond of experimenting, and as much at his means and Jelure permitted devoted his ener- {ce to electrical study and Investigation. Up to this period {ad been bis father's intention to make a priest of hin, ‘and the idea bung over the young physicist like a very ‘sword of Damocles, Finally he prevailed upon his worthy Dut reluctant sire to send him to Gratz in Austria to finish his studien at the Polytechnic School, and to prepare for work as profesor of mathematics and physics. At Gratz he saw and operated a Gramme machine for the firot time, and was so struck with the objections to the use of commutators and brushes that he made up bis mind bere and then to remedy that defect in dymamo-clecttic machines, In the second year of his course he abandoned the intention of becoming a teacher ‘and took up theenginesring curriculum. After three years ot absence he returned home, sally, to see his father die; Dot, having resolved to settle down in Austria, and recog- nizing the value of linguistic aoquirements, he went to Prague and then to Buda-Pesth with the view of master- ing the languages he deemed necessary. Up to this time hhe had never realized the enormous sacrifices that his parents had made in promoting his education, but he now began to feel the pinch and to grow unfamiliar with the Image of Francis Joseph I. Thore was considerable lag between his dispatches and the corresponding, remittance from home; and when the mathematical expression for