Nikola Tesla: Lesser-Known Details from His Private Life Page 8

going very well; I will soon send you news. If you have gone or intend to go to the coast, tell mother and uncle about those hundred forints I promised you for that purpose; I will send the money as soon as you let me know you need it. Just take care of yourself and try to get well. Greet mother and uncles and brothers-in-law and all the rest of the family. Your Nikola.”

Around the same day, overtaking each other, two letters arrived at Tesla’s address at the Astor House hotel in New York. One was from his youngest sister Marica and the other from his brother-in-law Nikoladin Kosanović, the priest from Plaški.

“I am quite well and (not) thinking of going to Rijeka, and besides, the winter is unusually mild here this year. I even received a gift from mama in Gospić, and just when I least expected it I got a letter from Simo. He writes that he is well and healthy, and we believe him all the more because we see from the invitation to the St. Sava speech that he will give some speech.

I know that will be especially pleasing to you too, because we had all already lost hope in him.

Here is some reading for you, and whatever better we notice in our literature we will send you.”

What kind of literature is meant is written in more detail by Tesla’s brother-in-law Nikoladin in his letter:

Tesla’s sisters Marica Kosanović, Angelina Trbojević, and Milka Glumičić: Tesla apparently loved the youngest, Marica, the most, worried most about the middle one, Milka, who became a widow early, and had the deepest spiritual bond with Angelina. Angelina had three sons and two daughters, Marica four sons, Milka one daughter who was named Đuka after her grandmother and whom Tesla supported through school.

I am sending you in 2 packages 8 booklets to read when you rest. Besides those you already know better than I do, such as “The Mountain Wreath,” “Čengić Aga,” I am sending you some prose and verse that our critics have declared the best among us in recent years. Some pieces by Veselinović (the village teacher from Serbia) and Lazarević have already been translated into the great languages, such as French, Italian, etc.

At the same time I am sending you one issue each of Branik and Srpski glas so you can see how they presented you to Serbdom and Slavdom. That is roughly how you have been presented by all the Serbian and Slavic newspapers, as far as I myself have read and heard. Do not be angry about the title. In the original it said “Serbian Inventor in America,” but I changed the title in Branik on my own initiative as you see. The editor thanked me in a special letter for the article and privately asked me to keep him informed about you and your work.”

Tesla and Pupin

“He was born on Venus and arrived on Earth either by spaceship or on the wings of a white dove…”