Nikola Tesla

Born in the Austrian Empire, now Croatia, Nikola Tesla was an engineer, inventor, and futurist who migrated to the United States to work for Thomas Edison. He was so brilliant that he was able to perform integral calculus in his head! He eventually left his mentor and raised funds to pursue his own research and inventions.

Tesla’s groundbreaking work was inspired by the goal of making electricity available to the masses. He believed he could provide free, unrestricted, clean power from the earth, though it was never commercially feasible, and his dream remained unrealized. Nonetheless, he was undeniably one of the most significant innovators of the 19th and 20th centuries.