This reversal of fortune has remained a hotly debated mystery to this day. Unfortunately Tesla was in no financial condition to fight Marconi's public company because his laboratory had just "mysteriously" burnt to the ground (along with all his papers and uninsured machinery). That Tesla had infuriated Edison by winning the bid to light the Colombian Exposition at the 1893 World's Fair with his new AC system of electricity (instead of Edison's inferior DC system) may or may not have had anything to do with the fire. Nevertheless many feel that a grave injustice may have been perpetrated by unethical businessmen, another issue which is unresolved and hotly debated to this day.
Orson Wells, who in similar fashion, angered William Randolph Hearst (and was forever blacklisted in the movie industry) for portraying him as CITIZEN KANE, was arguably the only person who had the courage (and experience) to make a movie on such a subject when the wounds were still open. In fact, one of Orson's last feature films -- TAJNA NIKOLE TESLE (aka THE SECRET OF NIKOLA TESLA in which Orson played J.P. Morgan) made in 1980 in Yugoslavia with foreign money -- is virtually unknown in the Land of the First Amendment. Orson's movie had few special effects of the type that are possible today (to bring turn-of-the-century New York City to life) and, as great as it was, only touched on the full dimensions of the Tesla tragedy.
Fortunately, in 1943, the United States Supreme Court finally rectified part of the injustices and named Nikola Tesla (with his patent 645,576) as the primary inventor of radio. It is unfortunate that most people still think that Marconi invented the radio, think that Edison was the greatest inventor ever, think that J.P. Morgan was not a crook and know little, if anything, about Nikola Tesla. But the greatest tragedy of all was that Nikola Tesla died just three months before the high court had made its rectifying decision. Tesla's only "crime" was that he wanted to give the World an abundant supply of cheap (or free), clean electrical energy and make it possible for his fellow humans to easily communicate with each other over vast distances.
The confluence of elements -- HEAVY CONFLICT (Edison and General Electric VS Tesla and Westinghouse); DRAMATIC CHARACTERS (Tesla, a good-looking eccentric Serbian genius, Mark Twain (Tesla's best friend), J.P. Morgan (and his beautiful daughter who fell in love with Tesla); Thomas Edison (sleep-deprived inventor who reneged on Tesla and even fired him for being too bright); incredibly IMPORTANT STORY (industrialized civilization would not have been possible without Tesla's invention of the polyphase generator and the long-range transmission of electrical energy made possible by Alternating Current); VISUAL SETTING (New York City at the turn of the century in "the age of innocence") and INCREADIBLE SPECIAL FXs (135-foot electrical sparks flying from Tesla's high frequency coils, Wardenclyffe Tower, the endless maze of dangerous electrical wiring strung all over New York City by 20 competing DC power companies) -- these elements combined make TESLA visually exciting,
tragic and potentially BEST PICTURE.
SUMMARY:
Most everyone has been lead to believe that THOMAS EDISON was the greatest inventor that ever lived and that GUGLIELMO MARCONI invented the radio. Actually Tesla filed the two critical underlying patents and physically demonstrated a radio system with all of the fundamental components in 1897 -- several years before Marconi. For this reason, Marconi's patent applications were rejected by the U.S Patent Office. But Marconi, an Italian nobleman of means, joined forces with Edison, ANDREW CARNEGI and J.P. MORGAN to establish a public corporation to beat Tesla to the market place, even though they had to use 17 of Tesla's patents. But suddenly in 1904, the U.S. Patent Office reversed its previous decision and granted Marconi the underlying patent for the invention of radio.
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