- While Newfoundland celebrations are in high gear this
year to mark the 100th anniversary of the first trans-Atlantic wireless
message, received by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in St. John's,
there are some people who believe Marconi wasn't the real pioneer of radio.
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- Nikola Tesla, who was born in Croatia in 1856, may not
be as well known as Marconi, but recently he's become the subject of an
increasing number of books and biographies because of his inventions, wireless
communication demonstrations and lectures in the late 1800s.
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- In fact, in 1943, after many years in dispute, the United
States Supreme Court ruled that Marconi's patent for wireless communication
(No. 763,772) was invalid because the same technology had been published
and registered by Tesla (patent No. 645,576) in 1897.
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- Unfortunately, Tesla died earlier that year.
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- Steve Silverman, a science teacher at Chatham high school
near Albany, N.Y., has devoted a chapter of his new book - Einstein's Refrigerator
and Other Stories from the Flip Side of History - to Tesla, who first came
to the U.S. in 1884. He notes that Marconi's radio didn't transmit voices.
It transmitted a signal, something Tesla had demonstrated years earlier.
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- "Tesla is one of those forgotten people of history,"
said Silverman, who believes Tesla should be considered the father of radio.
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- But Silverman also acknowledges Marconi's contribution.
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- "I don't think there's anything wrong with Marconi's
recognition. He's the one who basically brought wireless communication
to the masses. It is true that when it went to the U.S. Supreme Court,
he did lose in the patent fight. Tesla had the original patents on it,
but he didn't necessarily see where it was going," he said.
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- What Marconi did in Newfoundland was also the first overseas
transmission of a signal, which was a significant accomplishment, Silverman
added.
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- Tesla came to the U.S. initially to help Thomas Edison
perfect Edison's direct current (DC) system of electricity, but apparently
later quit working with Edison in a disagreement about bonus pay.
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- Tesla, however, went on to devise a better system for
electrical transmission - the alternating current (AC) system used in homes
today.
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- His other known inventions include florescent bulbs,
which he used in his lab some 40 years before industry invented them. And
he designed the world's first hydroelectric plant in Niagara Falls, and
patented the first speedometer for cars.
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- In 1898, he demonstrated to the world the first remote-controlled
model boat at Madison Square Garden in New York.
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- In 1899, he built a large radio station in Colorado Springs
to begin his experiments, and two years later constructed a huge radio
station in Wanderclyffe, near New York.
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- Silverman isn't the first author to focus on Tesla's
accomplishments or to cite the 1943 court case as justification for declaring
him the real inventor of wireless radio.
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- Margaret Cheney wrote Tesla, Man out of Time, and co-wrote
Nikola Tesla Master of Lightning, with Robert Uth.
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- Nikola Tesla Master of Lightning was also the title of
a PBS documentary which aired in December 2000 with actor Stacy Keach providing
the voice of Tesla. Promotional material for the documentary noted the
"considerable and growing interest in Tesla," and stated that
while Edison and Marconi are frequently credited with the invention of
AC power transmission and the radio, respectively, "the program demonstrates
that this is not the case."
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- Two other biographies of Tesla are Wizard, The Life and
Times of Nikola Tesla, Biography of a Genius, by Marc J. Seifer; and Nikola
Tesla, Life and Work of a Genius, published by the Yugoslavian Society
for the Promotion of Scientific Thought.
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- Tesla's ashes are in the the Museum of Nikola Tesla in
Belgrade, which also contains a wealth of archival material - more than
150,000 documents referring to the inventor's life and creative work, as
well as the significance of his inventions, which are featured in the museum's
exhibitions.
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- The museum's Web site is www. yurope.com/org/tesla.
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- Marconi's moment
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- While celebrations continue in this province to mark
the day Marconi received the Morse code signal for the letter "S"
from England atop Signal Hill in St. John's, the provincial Department
of Tourism doesn't want to debate who invented the technology first.
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- "We won't get into a discussion about who came first.
We are celebrating the moment in our history, the fact that the trans-Atlantic
signal was received in St. John's," said Catherina Kennedy-Kelly,
public relations director with the department.
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- "It's really a positive year for highlighting our
history, and for those who say there was a problem with Marconi's patent,
there are just as many who will argue that's not the case."
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- http://www.thetelegram.com/topstories/news/story.asp?id=46632&ln=ln
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