THE TRANSMISSION OF ELECTRIC ENERGY 

 WITHOUT WIRES. 



BY NIKOLA TESLA. 



[Nikola Tesla, electrician; born Sniiljan, Lika, 1S57; educated in the public schools 

 of Gospich; graduated from Real 8chule, KarLstadt, 1S73; studied at Polytechnic 

 school, in Gratz, to become a professor of mathematics, but later changed and com- 

 pleted the engineering course; studied languages and philosophy at Prague and 

 Buda-Pesth; was for a time assistant in government telegraph engineering depart- 

 ment, where he invented several improv(>ments ; afterwards became engineer for a 

 lighting company in Paris; afterwards came to the United States and was employed 

 by Edison company; later became electrician for the Tesla Electric Light company 

 and established the principle of the'rotary magnetic field embodied in the apparatus 

 used in transmission of power from Niagara Falls; inventor of various forms of dyna- 

 mos, induction coils, transformers, etc.] 



Towards the close of 1898 a systematic research, carried 

 on for a number of years with the object of perfecting a 

 method of transmission of electrical energy through the natural 

 medium, led me to recognize three important necessities: 

 First, to develop a transmitter of great power; second, to 

 perfect means for individualizing and isolating the energy 

 transmitted; and, third, to ascertain the laws of propagation 

 of currents through the earth and the atmosphere. Various 

 reasons, not the least of which was the help proffered by my 

 friend Leonard E. Curtis and the Colorado Springs Electric 

 company, determined me to select for my experimental inves- 

 tigations the large plateau, two thousand meters above sea 

 level, in the vicinity of that delightful resort, which I reached 

 late in May, 1899. I had not been there but a few days when 

 I congratulated myself on the happy choice and I began the 

 task, for which I had long trained myself, with a grateful sense 

 and full of inspiring hope. The perfect purity of the air, the 

 unequaled beauty of the sky, the imposing sight of a high 

 mountain range, the quiet and restfulness of the place — all 

 around contributed to make the conditions for scientific 

 observation ideal. To this was added the exhilarating influ- 

 ence of a glorious climate and a singular sharpening of the 

 senses. In those regions the organs undergo perceptible 

 physical changes. The eyes assume an extraordinary lim- 



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