TESLA, Nikola (1856-1943) - photo 1
TESLA, Nikola (1856-1943) - photo 2

TESLA, Nikola (1856-1943)

Lot 190
14.12.2022 10:30UTC +00:00
Classic
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£ 35 280
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
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ID 870821
Lot 190 | TESLA, Nikola (1856-1943)
Estimate value
£ 20 000 – 30 000
TESLA, Nikola (1856-1943)

Light and other High Frequency Phenomena. A lecture delivered before the National Electric Light Association at its Sixteenth Convention, held at St. Louis, MO, February 28th, March 1st and 2d, 1893. [New York: James Kempster Printing Company for the National Electric Light Association, 1893].

First edition, extremely rare offprint, inscribed by Tesla to the great American astronomer George Ellery Hale. In this famous lecture, Tesla made the first ever public demonstration of radio communication. It was by virtue of this lecture that Tesla was recognized by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers as discovering radio: ‘In a lecture-demonstration given in St. Louis […] – two years before Marconi’s first experiments – Tesla also predicted wireless communication; the apparatus that he employed contained all the elements of spark and continuous wave that were incorporated into radio’. The present lot is a separately-paginated offprint from the Proceedings of the National Electric Light Association. RBH/ABPC record no other copy of this offprint, nor any other book or pamphlet inscribed by Tesla.



The recipient of this offprint, George Ellery Hale (1868-1938), was an American astronomer and correspondent of Albert Einstein, best known for his discovery of magnetic fields in sunspots, and as the key figure in the planning or construction of several world-leading telescopes. He also played a key role in developing the California Institute of Technology into a leading research university. Tesla and Hale met on at least one occasion. In a letter to Hale of June 4, 1908, Tesla wrote: ‘I have greatly regretted that since our meeting at Chicago years ago, we have never been able to get again together. Your work interests me very much, and I am heartily in sympathy with you’. It is probable that this meeting was on the occasion of the World’s Fair, held May-October 1893 in Chicago, at which Tesla also gave a demonstration of his wireless experiments.



Octavo (238 x 159mm). Text illustrations throughout. Original printed wrappers (spine with some wear and chipping at ends, front wrapper detached); preserved in a custom box. Provenance: George Ellery Hale (1868-1938; inscribed by Tesla on front wrapper ‘Compliments of the Author’; Hale’s signature and ink stamp of the Kenwood Astrophysical Observatory in Chicago, of which Hale was director, also on front wrapper).





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Auction house category:Medicine & science, Printed books
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