Tesla: Man Out of Time,   ISBN:9780743215367

Customer Rating: 

I'd seen bits and pieces about the inventor Nikola Tesla on TV before and been a fan of the 80's rock band Tesla. I then watched a TV special about him a few months ago and wanted to know more. I got this book and I'm over 1/2 way through it and it is wonderful. Tesla was one of the premier inventors in History and certainly was a man out of time, coming up with inventions and concepts we are only able to appreciate today. He is also responsible for the mastery of alternating current and our lives today would be completely diferent without him. Everytime we turn on a light or run an appliance, we have Nikola Tesla to thank for it. It is also very sad that practically no one has ever heard of him and his contributions have been almost purposefully hidden from us for some reason. The book does a great job of going into his personal life and the behind the scenes world of his mental idiosyncracies and social relationships. The only thing negative I have to say is it is not a very technical book. It describes many of his ideas in very general terms. I would like to have more explanations of many of Tesla concepts such as electrical resonance for instance. The book is an easy read and pages go by quickly. People interested in history, science or biography will like this book and I can't wait to finish it.

Customer Rating: 

This book gives an insight into the scope of Tesla's work, his involvements with the other inventors and businessmen of his day and most interesting--his eccentricities.

Customer Rating: 

It is true that most Tesla biographies are based off one of the originals due to Tesla's very well-concealed private life. What "Man Out of Time" really does well is bring many of the ideas to life. After only a few chapters, the reader can begin to grasp what Tesla is like (personality wise) and the images of his lab just build in the back of the reader's mind. It is very true that Tesla just didn't have enough time, but it is still proven and definitely seen in this book that he was the greatest inventor and electrical engineer of the 19th and 20th century.

I high recommend this book. It could possibly be one of the best non-fictional reads there are.

Customer Rating: 

Nikola Tesla was a bachelor. Born in 1856, he died at age eighty-six in 1943. He was a prolific inventor. Addressing the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, Tesla introduced a new scientific principle. He hit upon the notion of a rotating magnetic field produced by two or more alternating currents out of step with each other to make his induction machine. Obsession plagued his life. He excelled in languages but starred in math at school. He had an abnormal ability to visualize and retain images. He was introduced to physics at age ten and was enthralled.

Tesla continued his studies at a school in Karstadt, (the family was Servian but lived in Croatia). In 1875 he was enrolled at the Austrian Polytechnic School in Graz. He sought to complete two years of work in one. In the second year, Nikola Tesla toyed with the idea of an alternative to direct current machines. His financial circumstances were grim. He had to become a school drop-out. He was basically self-taught.

From a telegraph office in Germany, Tesla moved to a telephone office in Paris in 1883. He travelled to America in 1884, the year of the panic. He gained employment with Thomas Edison on his first day. There were personality differences. Edison had a vested interest in direct current machines. Tesla redesigned the Edison dynamos. He thought he had been promised fifty thousand dollars for the work of a year. When it was not forthcoming he resigned.

Tesla made a deal with George Westinghouse for an alternating current system. The public was confused by Edison's propaganda and G.E.'s efforts to contest Tesla's priority of invention. It was never fully understood even by engineers that the system almost universally adopted was Tesla's. When Westinghouse faced a financial calamity, Tesla signed over his patents for the polyphase system to Westinghouse. The first commercial use of Tesla's system was undertaken in Telluride, Colorado, in 1891. Tesla gave demonstrations of light sources in 1893 at the Chicago World's Fair.

Milikan was inspired by Tesla's claim of cosmic rays and Compton, too, expressed his debt to his Victorian predecessor. Tesla anticipated the electron microscope and the atom smasher. Marconi and Tesla wrangled over priority in the matter of radio patents, although neither man originated the law suits. The polyphase system was used by the Niagra Falls Power Co. and it laid the groundwork for all the electricity service systems in the United States.

In 1895 there was a fire at Tesla's New York City laboratory. Everything was destroyed. The fire took place amid the happiest and most productive decade of Tesla's life. Newspapers reported that the fruits of genius had been swept away. His researches included radio, energy transmission, guided vehicles, liquid oxygen and X rays. A new lab was located on East Houston Street. Tesla accepted money from a financier, start-up funds, but to his material detriment rejected an alliance with the House of Morgan.

Because his work was interrupted, Tesla was bested by Linde in developing the commercial breakthrough to produce liquified oxygen. Tesla demonstrated a radio-controlled robot boat at Madison Square Garden in 1898. Tesla's laboratory was moved to Colorado Springs in 1899. He had an experimental lab built to his specifications. He returned to New York City in 1990 and in 1901 one of Tesla's patents specifically addressed the issue of supercooling conductors.

In 1943, after his death, the United States Supreme Court held that Tesla had anticipated all other contenders with his fundamental radio patents. Nikoa Tesla was ahead of his time and mistaken for a dreamer. In 1975 he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame. This is a wonderful book.

Customer Rating: 

We live today in comfort thanks to Tesla.
We have AC electricity today thanks to Tesla.
This man was a genius.
And this book renders him justice.
A great book suitable to all.
Great addition to any library.
Buy it!