TESLA'S LEGACY For large-scale wireless power transfer like his "World System," Tesla never intended to use coupled resonances. His famous Wardenclyffe Tower, a sprawling 180-foot structure based in Shoreham, Long Island, was to send information and electricity globally via the earth as a giant conductor.
After he sent the first wireless telegraph from Virginia to Hawaii in 1915, Tesla told The New York Times that the "transmission through the earth with the proper apparatus is not more difficult than the sending of a message on a wire strung across a room. This wonderful property of the planet that, electrically speaking, is through its very bigness small, is of incalculable significance for the future of mankind."
But Wardenclyffe never did transmit a telegraph, let alone electricity. As brilliant as Tesla was, he couldn't balance a checkbook. He eventually had to mortgage the Wardenclyffe property to the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel for back rent payments.
The tower was sold for scrap metal in 1917, more than 15 years after its initial construction. Eventually, the accompanying building was purchased by Peerless Photo Products, which was later bought out by AGFA.
Today, AGFA and the New York State Department of Environmental Control (DEC) are conducting a cleanup of photo chemicals dumped on the site over the years. Once cleanup is complete, two non-profit groups—Friends of Science East and the Tesla Wardenclyffe Project—hope to turn the site into the Tesla Museum and Science Center at Wardenclyffe.
They want to raise awareness of Tesla's vital contributions in electrifying society, like setting up the first power generator at Niagara Falls and inventing the concept of alternating current. Outside of engineering circles, The Prestige was the first time many people heard Tesla's name. With recent advances in wireless power transfer, Tesla might finally be recognized as an electricity celebrity.
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