03/12/2023
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Tesla’s Tower – Part I: New Insights into His Relationship with J. P. Morgan
Although inventor Nikola Tesla seemed to be written out of history for several decades, his unique life and work have become more well known over the last thirty years. His vision for wireless electrical power is often portrayed as having been thwarted by his financial backer, American financier and investment banker John Pierpont Morgan, Sr.. And though this is true in part, author Marc Seifer points out that there’s more to the story.
In his book, “Tesla: Wizard at War: The Genius, the Particle Beam Weapon, and the Pursuit of Power,” Seifer reveals several new insights into the known and potential reasons for Morgan’s defunding of the now famous Tesla tower. These new insights include:
- The documented reason for Morgan’s refusal to continue funding the tower is due to Tesla’s own breach of contract. Tesla had in fact built a tower twice as large as the one Morgan had agreed to fund, which is why Tesla ran out of money before finishing the project.
- Even though attaching a meter to the electrical output would have been difficult if not impossible, there were other ways to monetize Tesla’s tower. Television, for example, was free for decades due to advertising, which made more than enough money to sustain that industry, even though the end user was not directly charged for the service.
- After Morgan refused to give Tesla a second chance, Tesla sought funding elsewhere; and in every case, Morgan intervened and convinced Tesla’s would-be investors not to back him.
- While there is no known documentation or eyewitness testimony explaining why Morgan actively blocked Tesla’s network of wireless electrical transmission towers, it has been speculated that Morgan may have been motivated to shut down what might have been a serious disruption of the copper and rubber markets in which he had a large stake due to his mining and railroad transportation operations.
- Although Tesla did have philanthropic intentions in general and hoped that his work would be a blessing to humanity, he very clearly intended that his wireless electrical transmission system would generate great wealth for his investors. This is documented in proposal letters he wrote to potential investors.
- Tesla continued to privately implore Morgan to change his mind about funding his tower for many years afterward and once confessed to Morgan that he spent an entire year crying himself to sleep every night over the matter.
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Art by Elise
