Nikola Tesla, Power Wizard, Is Honored at Niagara Falls

Nikola Tesla, virtually unknown electrical genius whose work formed the foundation of the world's modern electrical systems, was honored in memory today by fellow engineers as they toured the Edward Dean Adams Station at Niagara Falls.

The visit of members of the Niagara International Section of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (AIEE) was the first event to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of Tesla, who died in 1943.

The AIEE group toured the Adams Station — where Tesla's polyphase alternating current system was first put to practical use. After dinner in the La Salle Yacht Club tonight, the group will hear Gardner H. Dales, administrative assistant in the System Project Engineering Department of the Niagara Mohawk Power Corporation. His talk will be on the Niagara Mohawk Adams Station and Tesla's contribution to it.

Today, nearly all electricity in the world is generated, transmitted, distributed and turned into mechanical power by means of the Tesla system. Tesla, although unheard of by most laymen, is credited with the greatest single group of inventions in the world of electrical engineering.

In the latter part of the nineteenth century a dispute raged between exponents of the two types of current — alternating or direct. Edison was a strong proponent of direct current. But it had some bad features — distribution over long distances was impossible. Alternating current was recognized as the coming, economical means of transmitting power.

Tesla, a young Yugoslav emigrant to the United States, invented the polyphase alternating current system and the means to use it. George Westinghouse acquired rights to the Tesla patents and, despite warnings from such men as Edison and Lord Kelvin, the Tesla system was adopted for the first great hydroelectric plant in Niagara Falls.

In 1896 Niagara Power from the Edward Dean Adams Station was running street cars 22 miles away in Buffalo and the age of electric power was born.