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Electricity is one of nature's
greatest forces.

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And by the middle
of the 20th century,

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we'd harnessed it to light
and power our modern world.

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Hundreds of years
of scientific discoveries

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and inventions brought us here.

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But it would take
the eccentric genius of one man

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to unlock the full potential
of electrical power.

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In the winter of 1943,

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Nikola Tesla looked out

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across the Manhattan skyline

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for the very last time.
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Tesla had been born into a world
powered by steam and lit by gas.

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But before his eyes,
he saw a new world.

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A world transformed,

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a world powered by electricity.

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His world.

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Frail, lonely

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and still mourning the death
of one of his beloved pigeons,

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this extraordinary
and eccentric genius

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knew that his life's work was done
and he laid back on his bed to die.

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It would be three days
before anyone found his body.

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Just over 200 years ago,
early scientists

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discovered electricity could be much
more than simply a static charge.

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It could be made to flow
in a continuous current.

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But they were about to discover
something profound.

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That electricity
is connected to magnetism.

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Harnessing the link
between magnetism and electricity

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would completely transform
the world

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and allow us to generate
seemingly limitless

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amounts of electrical power.

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This is the story of how
scientists and engineers

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unlocked the nature of electricity

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and then used it in an extraordinary
century of innovation and invention.

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But not before
one of the most shocking

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engineering rivalries in history
was finally laid to rest.

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Our story begins in London,

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at the beginning
of the 19th century,

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with a young man who would further
our understanding of electricity

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as much as any other.

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On 29th of February, 1812,

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a 20-year-old self-educated
bookbinder called Michael Faraday

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came here to the Royal institution
of Great Britain.
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He was surrounded by the great
and the good of the academic world.

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And he was about to listen

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to one of the greatest
scientific minds of the age.

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Faraday, the son of a blacksmith,
had finished his formal education

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when he was just 12 years old.

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He would never get to university.

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But he wasn't finished
with learning,

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as he was fascinated by science.

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Faraday worked long and hard
during the day, binding books.

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But in the evenings, he'd read
whatever scientific literature

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he could lay his hands on.

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He loved learning new things
about the world

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and he had this constant desire,
this passion,

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to understand why things
were they way they were.

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Reading scientific papers
was one thing.

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But to really satisfy
his craving for knowledge,

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Faraday was desperate to see
the experiments themselves.

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And he eventually got his chance

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when he was given a ticket to attend
one of the last lectures

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of England's greatest chemist
of the time, Sir Humphry Davy.

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It was to change
young Faraday's life forever.

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After watching Davy,
awe inspired and full of ideas,

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Faraday knew what he wanted to do
with his life.

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He was determined to dedicate
himself to furthering science.

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And that's just what he did.

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Within a year,
Davy had appointed him

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as an assistant
at the Royal institution.

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With Davy as his patron and,
well, his boss,

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Faraday studied
all manner of chemistry.

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But what would inspire
his greatest breakthroughs...

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were the invisible forces
of electricity and magnetism.

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In 1820, both were being studied
by a Danish scientist,

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Hans Christian Oersted,

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who'd made
an extraordinary discovery.

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He passed an electric current
through a copper rod

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and brought it close
to a magnetic compass needle

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and saw that it made
the needle rotate.

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To Oersted, it was remarkable.

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He'd shown, for the first time,

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an electric current
can create a magnetic force.

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He'd bound electricity
and magnetism together.
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Today we call it electro-magnetism.

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And it's one of the fundamental
forces of nature.

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Oersted's discovery
sparks off a whole new

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aspect of inventive activity

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around and about
the fields of electricity.

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You can almost see
electrical experimenters vying,

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competing with each other,

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to find new links between electricity
and the other powers of nature.

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At the Royal institution,

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Faraday set about
recreating Oersted's work,

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which would mark his first steps
to fame and fortune.

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And through his rigorous research,

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he concluded that there must be
a flow of forces

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acting between the wire
and the compass needle.

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The device he designed
to demonstrate it

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would change the course of history.

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Faraday created a circuit using
a battery like this,

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a pair of wires and a mercury bath.

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Now, the circuit carries on
through these copper posts,

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and this wire hangs freely,
it dangles into the mercury.

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Now, because mercury
is such a good conductor,

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it completes the circuit.

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When the current
runs through the circuit...

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..it generates a circular magnetic
force-field around the wire.

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Now, this interacts with the
magnetism from a permanent magnet

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that Faraday had placed
in the middle of the mercury.

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Together they forced
the wire to move.

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Faraday had proved that this
invisible force really does exist

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and he could see its effect -
circular motion.

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This beautiful device was the first
to convert electric current

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into continuous motion.
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Basically, it's the earliest ever
electric motor.

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But Faraday was about to take
this experiment further.

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One of the lasting effects

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of Faraday's discovery of
electromagnetic rotations in 1821,

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was that it showed that there was
a relationship of some sort

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between electricity and magnetism
and motion.

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Faraday explored
this relationship in detail

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and set himself an even more
difficult challenge.

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To use magnetism and motion
to make electricity.

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Eventually, his obsession,
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hard work and determination
paid off.

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The breakthrough came

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on the 17th of October 1831,

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when Faraday took a magnet like this
and moved it

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in and out of a coil of wire.

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He was able to detect a tiny
electric current in the coil,

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moving one way...

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..and then the other.

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Faraday knew he was onto something.

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A few days later,

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instead of moving the magnet
through the conducting wire coil,
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he set up the equivalent experiment

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by moving a conducting copper plate
through the magnetic field.

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He didn't know it at the time,

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but as his spinning disk cut through
this magnetic field,

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billions of negatively charged
electrons

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were deflected from their
original circular course,

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and began to drift towards the edge.

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A negative charge built up
at the outer edge of the disk,

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leaving a positive charge
at the centre,

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and once the disk
was connected to wires,

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the electrons flowed
in a steady stream.

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Faraday had generated a continuous
flow of electric current.

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Unlike a battery,

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his current flowed for as long
as his copper disk was spun.

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He'd created electrical power
directly from mechanical power.

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Although Faraday's discovery
of conduction was extraordinarily
important in its own right,

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and had profound effects for
the understanding of electricity

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and technology
for the rest of the 19th century,

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for Faraday what it did is open up
a decade of powerful research,

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because it gave him a clue about
how he should pursue his research.
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While Faraday continued his work,

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trying to understand the very nature
of electricity,

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inventors across Europe
were less interested in the science

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and more interested in how
electricity could make them money.

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What's actually quite remarkable,
certainly from
a contemporary perspective,

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is that, by and large,

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nobody really seems to care very much
what electricity is.

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You don't have great theoretical
debates

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as to whether it's a force, or a
fluid, or a principal, or a power.

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What they're really interested in
is what electricity can do.
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Faraday,
living in a world of steam power,

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was informing
the scientific community

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about the nature of electricity,

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but at the same time
another breakthrough

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in how we could actually use it
had been made.

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This would be the first device

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that really brought electricity
out of the laboratory

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and into the hands
of ordinary people.

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The telegraph.

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The key to understanding
the telegraph

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is understanding a special kind
of magnet, an electromagnet.

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Basically, a magnet created
by an electric current.

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The first electromagnets
were developed independently

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by William Sturgeon in Britain
and Joseph Henry in America.

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And just as Faraday had discovered
that by coiling his wire,

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he could increase the current in it
produced by the moving magnet,

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so Henry and Sturgeon discovered

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that by adding more coils
in their current carrying wires,

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they could make a more concentrated
magnetic field.

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Basically, the more coils, the more
turns, the stronger the magnet.

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So if I pass a current through
this electromagnet,

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you can actually see
the effects of the magnetic field.

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This is the standard
school experiment

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of sprinkling iron filings
on top of the magnet.

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If I give it a tap,

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see the iron filings
follow the contours of the field.

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This allows us to visualise
the effects of magnetism.

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To make an electromagnet
even stronger,

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Henry and Sturgeon discovered
that they could place

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certain kinds of metal
inside the electromagnetic coil.

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The reason iron is so effective
is fascinating

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because you can think of it as being
made up of lots of tiny magnets,

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all pointing in random directions.

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At the moment, this is not a magnet.

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The tiny magnets inside are aligned
similarly to these compass needles.

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If you see, they're all pointing
in different directions.

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But when you apply a magnetic field,
they all align together,

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they all combine, these magnets,

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and cumulatively they add to
the strength of the electromagnet.

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So what Henry and Sturgeon did,

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was place two electromagnetic coils
on each arm of their horseshoe,
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to create something that was many,
many times more powerful.

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And we can see the power
of this horseshoe electromagnet.

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If I turn it on and use something
slightly bigger than iron filings,

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these small pieces of iron,

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look at the strength of the magnetic
field, holding them in place.

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What's important to remember,
of course,

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is that this electromagnet
only works

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all the time there's a current
passing through it.

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As soon as I turn off the current...

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the magnetism disappears.

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Early experimenters showed off
this power by lifting metal weights.

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Henry even made one big enough
to lift a tonne-and-a-half of metal.

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Impressive but not world-changing.

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But place that magnet much further
away, at the end of a wire,

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and suddenly you can make
something happen at your command.

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In an instant.

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This ability to control
a magnet at a distance,

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is one of the most useful things
we've ever discovered.

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If electricity can be made visible

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a long way away from the original
source of power,

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then you've got a source of
instantaneous communication.

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By the middle of the 1840s,

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Samuel Morse had developed
a messaging system,

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based on how long an electrical
circuit was switched on or off.

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A long pulse of current for a dash,
a short burst for a dot.

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This allowed messages to be sent
and received by using a simple code.

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Contemporary early Victorian
commentators

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reflect on the fact that electricity

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and the telegraph is literally
making their world a smaller place.

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You very often get a sort of rhetoric
throughout the 19th century,

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when people are talking
about the telegraph,
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about how more communication,
more understanding,

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will render war obsolete,

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because we'll all understand
each other better.

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I mean, retrospectively,
it seems...hopelessly utopian.

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By the 1850s,

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Europe and America were
criss-crossed

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with land-based telegraph wires,

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but the dream of instant
global communication

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was frustratingly out of reach.

247
00:17:06,400 --> 00:17:09,040
This was because
there was still no cable

248
00:17:09,040 --> 00:17:11,760
capable of carrying messages

249
00:17:11,760 --> 00:17:16,480
between two of the greatest powers
on earth -

250
00:17:16,480 --> 00:17:19,120
Britain and America.

251
00:17:19,120 --> 00:17:21,280
Many experts were convinced

252
00:17:21,280 --> 00:17:24,800
that a working Atlantic cable
was impossible.

253
00:17:24,800 --> 00:17:28,120
But those who disagreed knew that
if they could solve this problem,

254
00:17:28,120 --> 00:17:30,080
it could make them serious money.

255
00:17:30,080 --> 00:17:34,800
And in the 1850s, American
businessmen and British engineers

256
00:17:34,800 --> 00:17:38,080
joined forces
to prove this could be done.

257
00:17:41,080 --> 00:17:44,880
Attempt after attempt
ended in disaster.

258
00:17:44,880 --> 00:17:49,240
The heavy cables kept snapping
in heavy seas and storms.
259
00:17:51,440 --> 00:17:55,520
Finally, on 29th July 1858,

260
00:17:55,520 --> 00:18:00,120
two parts of a cable were spliced
together in mid-Atlantic.

261
00:18:00,120 --> 00:18:04,520
You see, a single cable was simply
too big to be carried by one ship.

262
00:18:04,520 --> 00:18:07,600
Then one end was taken
to Newfoundland,

263
00:18:07,600 --> 00:18:10,960
and the other end
to south-west Ireland.

264
00:18:10,960 --> 00:18:13,680
Six days later,
the first direct link

265
00:18:13,680 --> 00:18:18,320
between the two most powerful
nations in the world was in place.

266
00:18:18,320 --> 00:18:22,720
The project was hailed
a huge success

267
00:18:22,720 --> 00:18:25,800
and a formal message
of congratulations

268
00:18:25,800 --> 00:18:29,920
was sent from Queen Victoria
to President Buchanan.
269
00:18:29,920 --> 00:18:33,280
But before the celebrations
were over,

270
00:18:33,280 --> 00:18:36,320
things started to go very wrong.

271
00:18:36,320 --> 00:18:40,640
This is Chief Engineer Bright's
original notebook.

272
00:18:40,640 --> 00:18:45,280
You can see here Queen Victoria's
original message.

273
00:18:45,280 --> 00:18:50,560
Now, it's only 98 words long,
but it took 16 hours to transmit.

274
00:18:51,720 --> 00:18:55,120
The telegraph operators on
the other side found it very hard

275
00:18:55,120 --> 00:18:57,000
to decipher the message.

276
00:18:57,000 --> 00:18:59,920
The electrical signals
they were receiving

277
00:18:59,920 --> 00:19:01,840
were blurred and distorted

278
00:19:01,840 --> 00:19:05,760
and they kept asking for words
to be repeated over and over again.
279
00:19:05,760 --> 00:19:06,920
So you can see here,

280
00:19:06,920 --> 00:19:11,800
"Repeat after sending.
Waiting to receive, no signals."

281
00:19:11,800 --> 00:19:14,840
Clearly,
transmitting across the Atlantic

282
00:19:14,840 --> 00:19:18,880
wasn't going to be as
straightforward as people had hoped.

283
00:19:20,400 --> 00:19:25,560
Over the next few days, several
hundred messages were exchanged,

284
00:19:25,560 --> 00:19:28,280
but those arriving in Newfoundland

285
00:19:28,280 --> 00:19:31,360
became almost impossible
to decipher,

286
00:19:31,360 --> 00:19:34,280
just a jumbled mess
of dots and dashes.

287
00:19:34,280 --> 00:19:38,000
There was a serious problem with
the cable and it was getting worse.

288
00:19:38,000 --> 00:19:43,000
Well, the 1858 cable
was never fully repaired,

289
00:19:43,000 --> 00:19:49,320
and the end finally came when
British engineer Wildman Whitehouse

290
00:19:49,320 --> 00:19:54,000
mistakenly believed that by
increasing the signal voltage

291
00:19:54,000 --> 00:19:56,960
he could force the messages
through to Newfoundland.

292
00:19:56,960 --> 00:19:59,920
The cable simply
stopped working altogether.

293
00:20:05,080 --> 00:20:07,680
At the time, increasing the voltage

294
00:20:07,680 --> 00:20:11,960
by using more powerful batteries
made sense.

295
00:20:11,960 --> 00:20:15,160
Most experts believed
electric current

296
00:20:15,160 --> 00:20:18,760
flowed through a cable,
like a fluid in a pipe.

297
00:20:18,760 --> 00:20:21,920
Increasing the voltage
was the equivalent

298
00:20:21,920 --> 00:20:24,080
of increasing the pressure
in the system -

299
00:20:24,080 --> 00:20:28,080
forcing the current through
to the other end.

300
00:20:28,080 --> 00:20:31,160
But the telegraph
was actually carrying pulses,

301
00:20:31,160 --> 00:20:33,760
or ripples of currents
along the cable,

302
00:20:33,760 --> 00:20:36,240
not a continuous stream.

303
00:20:36,240 --> 00:20:38,720
And over long distances,

304
00:20:38,720 --> 00:20:41,400
these pulses
were becoming distorted,

305
00:20:41,400 --> 00:20:45,680
making it difficult to tell
what was a short dot

306
00:20:45,680 --> 00:20:48,240
and which was a longer dash.

307
00:20:48,240 --> 00:20:52,200
By studying the effectiveness
of underwater cabling,

308
00:20:52,200 --> 00:20:54,800
scientists were beginning
to understand

309
00:20:54,800 --> 00:20:59,200
that electric current
didn't always flow like water,

310
00:20:59,200 --> 00:21:05,360
but was also creating invisible
electromagnetic waves, or ripples.

311
00:21:05,360 --> 00:21:09,440
And it's this breakthrough
that would lead to a new branch

312
00:21:09,440 --> 00:21:12,960
of research
into the electromagnetic spectrum,

313
00:21:12,960 --> 00:21:17,160
and solve the problems
of the Atlantic telegraph.

314
00:21:18,160 --> 00:21:20,880
In effect, the Transatlantic Cable

315
00:21:20,880 --> 00:21:26,320
was a giant, ambitious,
hugely expensive experiment.

316
00:21:26,320 --> 00:21:32,120
The failure of science to keep pace
with technology had been exposed.

317
00:21:32,120 --> 00:21:38,440
And a new, more theoretical and,
for me, much more exciting approach

318
00:21:38,440 --> 00:21:43,000
to understanding electricity
began to unfold.

319
00:21:47,640 --> 00:21:51,320
Armed with this new understanding
of how electric pulses

320
00:21:51,320 --> 00:21:55,360
actually moved along the cable,
improvements were made

321
00:21:55,360 --> 00:21:59,040
to its composition, design,
and how it was laid.

322
00:22:02,040 --> 00:22:06,200
It would take another eight years
of scientists and engineers

323
00:22:06,200 --> 00:22:11,000
working together before a working
cable was finally put in place.

324
00:22:13,360 --> 00:22:17,200
And on Friday 27th July 1866,

325
00:22:17,200 --> 00:22:21,560
a message was sent
from Ireland to Newfoundland.

326
00:22:21,560 --> 00:22:23,120
Clear and crisp.

327
00:22:25,520 --> 00:22:30,080
"A treaty of peace has been signed
between Austria and Prussia."

328
00:22:31,200 --> 00:22:35,120
At last, the dream of instant
transatlantic communication

329
00:22:35,120 --> 00:22:36,920
had become a reality.
330
00:22:39,640 --> 00:22:45,280
The success of the 1866 cable
makes the world a smaller place.

331
00:22:45,280 --> 00:22:47,320
Yet again.

332
00:22:49,160 --> 00:22:54,480
The change from a world where it
took days or weeks or months

333
00:22:54,480 --> 00:22:56,840
for information to travel,

334
00:22:56,840 --> 00:23:02,200
to a world in which information
took seconds or minutes to travel -

335
00:23:02,200 --> 00:23:03,560
it is far more profound

336
00:23:03,560 --> 00:23:07,240
than almost anything that's
taken place during my lifetime.

337
00:23:09,640 --> 00:23:14,280
The invention of the telegraph
changed ordinary people's lives.

338
00:23:14,280 --> 00:23:16,640
But it would be the breakthroughs

339
00:23:16,640 --> 00:23:20,760
in how we used continuously
flowing electric current

340
00:23:20,760 --> 00:23:23,760
that would have
an even greater impact.

341
00:23:25,560 --> 00:23:30,640
Because inventors were developing
a new way of using electricity.

342
00:23:34,920 --> 00:23:39,040
To make something every person
in the world would want -

343
00:23:39,040 --> 00:23:42,520
electric light.

344
00:23:45,920 --> 00:23:48,480
Until the 19th century,

345
00:23:48,480 --> 00:23:54,240
we only knew of one way
to make our own light - burn things.

346
00:24:02,560 --> 00:24:05,400
And by the middle
of the 19th century,

347
00:24:05,400 --> 00:24:09,200
we'd perfected a very effective way
of lighting our homes -

348
00:24:09,200 --> 00:24:10,400
using gas.

349
00:24:15,200 --> 00:24:19,080
A typical British home in the 1860s
would have been lit like this -

350
00:24:19,080 --> 00:24:20,760
highly-flammable gas
351
00:24:20,760 --> 00:24:24,320
would have been pumped directly into
people's houses

352
00:24:24,320 --> 00:24:26,200
through a network of pipes.

353
00:24:29,280 --> 00:24:34,480
But these gas lamps were too dull
for large outdoor areas.

354
00:24:34,480 --> 00:24:38,600
So railway stations
and streets began to be lit

355
00:24:38,600 --> 00:24:42,800
from a more powerful source -
electric arc lights.

356
00:24:44,040 --> 00:24:47,800
The first arc lights
were demonstrated

357
00:24:47,800 --> 00:24:51,480
by Michael Faraday's mentor,
Sir Humphry Davy,

358
00:24:51,480 --> 00:24:53,720
at the Royal institution
as early as 1808,

359
00:24:53,720 --> 00:24:58,640
and they worked by passing
a continuous spark of electricity

360
00:24:58,640 --> 00:25:01,360
across two carbon rods.
361
00:25:04,800 --> 00:25:09,200
But their intense white glow was
just too bright for people's homes.

362
00:25:09,200 --> 00:25:12,680
For an electric light
to compete with gas,

363
00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:15,600
it would need to be subdivided
into many smaller,

364
00:25:15,600 --> 00:25:19,080
less powerful and more gentle lamps.

365
00:25:19,080 --> 00:25:22,320
Whoever succeeded in
bringing electric light

366
00:25:22,320 --> 00:25:26,440
to every home in the land
was guaranteed fame and fortune.

367
00:25:26,440 --> 00:25:31,000
And by the early 1880s,
the most famous, most prodigious,

368
00:25:31,000 --> 00:25:34,840
most fiercely competitive inventor
in the world

369
00:25:34,840 --> 00:25:36,760
had taken on the challenge.

370
00:25:36,760 --> 00:25:41,160
The American, Thomas Alva Edison.

371
00:25:42,400 --> 00:25:45,520
For Edison, invention was a passion,

372
00:25:45,520 --> 00:25:49,400
it's what he loved doing.
He loved being in the laboratory.

373
00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:52,400
The first thing that drove
that passion is that

374
00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:56,760
it was a lot of fun for Edison.
That was the thing that he found

375
00:25:56,760 --> 00:26:00,720
most exciting, is that
this was something he did well,

376
00:26:00,720 --> 00:26:05,040
and it allowed all of his creativity
to come to the fore.

377
00:26:05,040 --> 00:26:07,560
Edison is Mr Electrical Invention.

378
00:26:09,640 --> 00:26:11,720
He's the man they trust.

379
00:26:11,720 --> 00:26:16,280
He's the man
that they think can do anything.

380
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:21,000
He's also the man who has his
carefully cultivated connections

381
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:26,520
with entrepreneurs, with people
that are willing to put their cash
382
00:26:26,520 --> 00:26:28,920
where Edison's mouth is,
so to speak,

383
00:26:28,920 --> 00:26:31,280
and back him
in this sort of venture.

384
00:26:31,280 --> 00:26:34,560
For Edison, the money was probably
the least important reason.

385
00:26:34,560 --> 00:26:37,360
For Edison, the money was important
for one reason -

386
00:26:37,360 --> 00:26:39,280
to allow him to do the next project.

387
00:26:41,880 --> 00:26:47,000
Edison had assembled a group
of young and talented engineers

388
00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:50,320
at a cutting-edge laboratory
in New Jersey,

389
00:26:50,320 --> 00:26:52,360
26 miles from Manhattan.

390
00:26:54,680 --> 00:26:56,440
Menlo Park would become

391
00:26:56,440 --> 00:27:00,400
the world's first
research and development facility,
392
00:27:00,400 --> 00:27:04,840
allowing Edison's team to invent
on an industrial scale.

393
00:27:06,400 --> 00:27:09,280
They worked incredible hours,
you know,

394
00:27:09,280 --> 00:27:12,880
one of them talked about how
he hardly ever saw his children

395
00:27:12,880 --> 00:27:14,920
cos he was in the lab all the time.

396
00:27:20,520 --> 00:27:24,160
But they knew they were in the midst
of something really important.

397
00:27:24,160 --> 00:27:25,640
That if Edison succeeded,

398
00:27:25,640 --> 00:27:28,920
if they succeeded with Edison,
their futures were secure.

399
00:27:35,440 --> 00:27:40,800
Edison's dream was to bring electric
light to every home in the land,

400
00:27:40,800 --> 00:27:42,960
and with his team of engineers
behind him,

401
00:27:42,960 --> 00:27:47,480
and the vision of an electric future
ahead, he launched his campaign.

402
00:27:49,520 --> 00:27:53,840
The race to bring electric light
to the world was to play out

403
00:27:53,840 --> 00:27:58,200
in the great cities of the time -
New York, Paris, London.

404
00:27:59,440 --> 00:28:03,840
Edison's Menlo Park team
set about developing

405
00:28:03,840 --> 00:28:07,440
a totally different form
of electric lamp -

406
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:09,640
the incandescent light bulb.

407
00:28:10,960 --> 00:28:16,760
In fact, Edison's light bulb design
wasn't all that new. Or unique.

408
00:28:16,760 --> 00:28:20,640
French, Russian, Belgian
and British inventors

409
00:28:20,640 --> 00:28:24,840
had been perfecting similar bulbs
for over 40 years.

410
00:28:24,840 --> 00:28:28,640
And one of them,
an Englishman, Joseph Swan,

411
00:28:28,640 --> 00:28:33,400
had been developing his own version
of an incandescent lamp.

412
00:28:33,400 --> 00:28:35,880
Both Swan and Edison's light bulbs

413
00:28:35,880 --> 00:28:38,960
worked by passing an electric
current through a filament.

414
00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:43,560
Now, a filament is a material
in which the electric current

415
00:28:43,560 --> 00:28:46,960
flows through with
more difficulty than it does

416
00:28:46,960 --> 00:28:51,600
through the copper wire
in the rest of the circuit.

417
00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:53,800
And it relies on
the idea of resistance.

418
00:28:53,800 --> 00:28:57,920
Inside this jar, I have a filament
made out of ordinary pencil lead,

419
00:28:57,920 --> 00:29:01,400
and we can see what happens
as I pass a current through it.

420
00:29:03,040 --> 00:29:05,040
Down at the atomic scale,

421
00:29:05,040 --> 00:29:08,920
the atoms in the filament
impede the flow of electricity.

422
00:29:08,920 --> 00:29:12,040
So it takes more energy
to force it through,

423
00:29:12,040 --> 00:29:15,920
and this energy is deposited
in the filament as heat.

424
00:29:15,920 --> 00:29:18,600
Now, as it heats up,
its resistance goes up,

425
00:29:18,600 --> 00:29:23,080
which again raises its temperature,
until it glows white-hot.

426
00:29:26,040 --> 00:29:28,280
Now, one of the first materials

427
00:29:28,280 --> 00:29:31,520
Edison used for his filaments
was platinum.

428
00:29:35,080 --> 00:29:38,200
With its relatively high
melting point,

429
00:29:38,200 --> 00:29:40,080
platinum could be heated

430
00:29:40,080 --> 00:29:43,560
to a white-hot temperature
without melting.

431
00:29:43,560 --> 00:29:48,680
It could also be stretched into thin
strands, and the thinner the strand,

432
00:29:48,680 --> 00:29:53,320
the more resistance it offered
to the current passing through it.

433
00:29:53,320 --> 00:29:57,800
But platinum was expensive
and didn't offer enough resistance.

434
00:29:59,920 --> 00:30:03,880
The race was on
to find a better alternative

435
00:30:03,880 --> 00:30:07,600
and the solution came
when the Menlo Park team

436
00:30:07,600 --> 00:30:11,400
switched to a method Swan was also
developing,

437
00:30:11,400 --> 00:30:14,240
using a vacuum to stop cheaper
carbon filaments

438
00:30:14,240 --> 00:30:16,920
from burning up too quickly.

439
00:30:18,080 --> 00:30:21,200
Edison and Swan tested all kinds
of different materials

440
00:30:21,200 --> 00:30:23,280
for their filaments -

441
00:30:23,280 --> 00:30:27,240
everything from raw silk
and parchment to cork.

442
00:30:27,240 --> 00:30:31,080
Edison even tested his
engineers' beard hair.
443
00:30:31,080 --> 00:30:34,480
Eventually,
he settled on bamboo fibre,

444
00:30:34,480 --> 00:30:37,520
while Swan used
a treated cotton thread.

445
00:30:38,720 --> 00:30:43,000
Edison and Swan's light bulb
designs were very similar.

446
00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:46,560
Eventually they came to an agreement
and went into partnership

447
00:30:46,560 --> 00:30:49,520
to sell light bulbs in the UK.

448
00:30:49,520 --> 00:30:53,560
Today, many people still believe
that Edison alone

449
00:30:53,560 --> 00:30:58,720
invented the light bulb, whilst Swan
has become a footnote in history.

450
00:31:05,800 --> 00:31:10,920
But his incandescent bulb
was only part of Edison's strategy.

451
00:31:10,920 --> 00:31:16,000
He'd also invented an entire
electrical system of sockets,

452
00:31:16,000 --> 00:31:17,680
cables, and meters to go with it.
453
00:31:17,680 --> 00:31:20,640
And, being a brilliant businessman,

454
00:31:20,640 --> 00:31:26,480
he'd developed a ground-breaking
new way of distributing electricity.

455
00:31:26,480 --> 00:31:30,320
Edison knew that the key
to making money from his system

456
00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:33,560
was to generate the electricity
in a central station,

457
00:31:33,560 --> 00:31:37,400
and then sell it
to as many customers as possible.

458
00:31:37,400 --> 00:31:39,960
It seems obvious to us now,
but until then,

459
00:31:39,960 --> 00:31:41,920
anyone who wanted to use electricity

460
00:31:41,920 --> 00:31:45,680
had to have their
own noisy generator to make it.

461
00:31:47,840 --> 00:31:50,280
Edison's ambition was huge -

462
00:31:50,280 --> 00:31:53,240
he wanted to light
the fastest-growing

463
00:31:53,240 --> 00:31:56,000
and most exciting city in the world.

464
00:32:00,240 --> 00:32:01,920
New York.

465
00:32:03,120 --> 00:32:07,640
In the summer of 1882,
Edison stood in a unique position,

466
00:32:07,640 --> 00:32:11,080
at the centre of 19th century
science and invention.

467
00:32:11,080 --> 00:32:16,080
He'd patented a cutting-edge
incandescent light bulb,

468
00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:20,160
he'd amassed an unprecedented
knowledge of electrical engineering.

469
00:32:20,160 --> 00:32:21,400
And above all,

470
00:32:21,400 --> 00:32:24,640
he'd cultivated a reputation
among the American public

471
00:32:24,640 --> 00:32:27,360
of being such a genius inventor,

472
00:32:27,360 --> 00:32:29,840
that journalists
hung on his every word,

473
00:32:29,840 --> 00:32:32,680
and the financial muscle
of Wall Street
474
00:32:32,680 --> 00:32:36,040
was quick to throw itself
behind his new ideas.

475
00:32:36,040 --> 00:32:38,520
His vision, to electrify Manhattan,

476
00:32:38,520 --> 00:32:41,640
and then, of course,
the rest of the world,

477
00:32:41,640 --> 00:32:44,200
was seemingly within his grasp.

478
00:32:49,160 --> 00:32:50,880
Because Edison and his team

479
00:32:50,880 --> 00:32:56,800
were about to launch their most
expensive and risky project yet -

480
00:32:56,800 --> 00:32:58,520
America's first power station,

481
00:32:58,520 --> 00:33:01,600
generating continuous
direct current.

482
00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:10,120
Just before 3pm on the
4th September 1882, Thomas Edison,

483
00:33:10,120 --> 00:33:14,560
surrounded by a gaggle of bankers,
dignitaries and reporters,

484
00:33:14,560 --> 00:33:17,920
entered JP Morgan's building,
right behind me,

485
00:33:17,920 --> 00:33:20,640
flicked one of the
Edison-patented switches,

486
00:33:20,640 --> 00:33:26,280
and 100 of his incandescent bulbs
began to glow.

487
00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:28,440
Turning to a nearby journalist,
he said,

488
00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:32,480
"I have accomplished
all that I've promised."

489
00:33:35,400 --> 00:33:39,720
Half a mile away on Pearl Street,
Edison's new power station,

490
00:33:39,720 --> 00:33:44,200
costing half a million dollars
and four years of hard work,

491
00:33:44,200 --> 00:33:45,960
had sprung into life.

492
00:33:47,600 --> 00:33:49,920
The current
surged through buried cables,

493
00:33:49,920 --> 00:33:53,920
stretching out in each direction.

494
00:33:53,920 --> 00:33:56,560
Of course
it might seem obvious to us now,

495
00:33:56,560 --> 00:33:59,360
but in New York back in
the early 1880s,

496
00:33:59,360 --> 00:34:02,800
the idea of burying
electric cables underground

497
00:34:02,800 --> 00:34:05,480
seemed like an unnecessary expense.

498
00:34:05,480 --> 00:34:08,240
This street would have been
criss-crossed

499
00:34:08,240 --> 00:34:11,240
with hundreds of cables,
used for telegraphs,

500
00:34:11,240 --> 00:34:13,680
telephones and arc street lighting.

501
00:34:13,680 --> 00:34:18,320
Looking up, you'd have seen
a tangled mass of black spaghetti

502
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:20,960
blocking out the light.

503
00:34:20,960 --> 00:34:24,680
Edison knew this dangerous situation
had to change,

504
00:34:24,680 --> 00:34:29,160
and for him to make as much money
as he could,
505
00:34:29,160 --> 00:34:33,760
electricity needed rebranding.
It had to be considered safe.

506
00:34:33,760 --> 00:34:37,520
So Edison is arguing
both for the greater safety

507
00:34:37,520 --> 00:34:42,680
of his DC low voltage system,
and for underground lines.

508
00:34:42,680 --> 00:34:45,280
He can argue
that he has a much safer system

509
00:34:45,280 --> 00:34:49,160
than electric arc light for streets,

510
00:34:49,160 --> 00:34:52,200
or gas lighting
for indoor lighting.

511
00:34:52,200 --> 00:34:56,000
He doesn't have to worry about fires,
or electrocution,

512
00:34:56,000 --> 00:34:57,520
that all of this is much safer

513
00:34:57,520 --> 00:35:00,880
because of the system he's created
with this underground system.

514
00:35:03,600 --> 00:35:06,440
Burying every cable
was not only very expensive
515
00:35:06,440 --> 00:35:09,040
but was a logistical nightmare,

516
00:35:09,040 --> 00:35:13,240
because this was one of the busiest
square miles in the world.

517
00:35:13,240 --> 00:35:16,320
Edison chose this area for a reason.

518
00:35:16,320 --> 00:35:18,080
Wall Street.

519
00:35:18,080 --> 00:35:21,400
Rich, important, influential.

520
00:35:21,400 --> 00:35:24,000
Because for Edison's system
to make money,

521
00:35:24,000 --> 00:35:26,040
all these wealthy customers

522
00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:29,360
had to be within a mile
of his power station.

523
00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:35,920
And this was because
Edison calculated

524
00:35:35,920 --> 00:35:37,960
the thickest cable
he could afford

525
00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:42,680
would only carry an adequate amount
of his continuous direct current

526
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:46,320
to customers within this range.

527
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:49,000
This was a huge leap forward

528
00:35:49,000 --> 00:35:51,840
because, for the first time,

529
00:35:51,840 --> 00:35:56,200
dozens of customers could be
supplied by just one power station.

530
00:35:56,200 --> 00:35:58,560
But there was a big problem.

531
00:35:58,560 --> 00:36:01,960
Edison's network could never
be economical in lighting

532
00:36:01,960 --> 00:36:04,160
America's new suburbs.

533
00:36:04,160 --> 00:36:07,360
They just didn't have
the concentration of customers

534
00:36:07,360 --> 00:36:11,440
needed to make building these
expensive power stations worthwhile.

535
00:36:12,920 --> 00:36:14,880
Had we stuck with Edison's way

536
00:36:14,880 --> 00:36:17,960
of generating
and distributing electricity,

537
00:36:17,960 --> 00:36:20,760
the world would be
a very different place.

538
00:36:21,920 --> 00:36:25,760
We'd have to have power stations
scattered around

539
00:36:25,760 --> 00:36:30,360
no more than a mile apart, even in
the centres of our towns and cities.

540
00:36:30,360 --> 00:36:34,360
And it would be extraordinarily
expensive to even provide power

541
00:36:34,360 --> 00:36:36,160
for smaller communities.

542
00:36:39,920 --> 00:36:43,320
But someone who held the answers
to these problems

543
00:36:43,320 --> 00:36:45,280
was about to enter the story.

544
00:36:45,280 --> 00:36:49,320
Someone who would help
create the modern world

545
00:36:49,320 --> 00:36:53,280
and who'd play an integral part
in one of the biggest fall-outs

546
00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:55,160
in scientific history.
547
00:36:55,160 --> 00:36:57,720
His name was Nikola Tesla

548
00:36:57,720 --> 00:37:00,680
and he was right under
Edison's nose.

549
00:37:06,760 --> 00:37:10,080
Nikola Tesla was a Serbian inventor

550
00:37:10,080 --> 00:37:12,240
who was born in Croatia

551
00:37:12,240 --> 00:37:14,920
and who worked for Edison briefly

552
00:37:14,920 --> 00:37:18,440
after arriving in New York
at the age of 28.

553
00:37:18,440 --> 00:37:22,800
European, introverted,
a deep thinker,

554
00:37:22,800 --> 00:37:26,000
he was everything Edison wasn't.

555
00:37:26,000 --> 00:37:28,520
Edison and Tesla could not be more
different

556
00:37:28,520 --> 00:37:32,000
in the way they handled their self,
appearance, and their manners,

557
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:35,400
and the way that they constructed
a public image for themselves.

558
00:37:35,400 --> 00:37:38,240
Edison couldn't care less
about the clothes he had on

559
00:37:38,240 --> 00:37:41,240
and if he spilt chemicals
on his good Sunday suit,

560
00:37:41,240 --> 00:37:43,760
then he spilt chemicals
on his good Sunday suit.

561
00:37:43,760 --> 00:37:48,480
He was, you know, basically,
a very kind of slovenly guy.

562
00:37:48,480 --> 00:37:50,640
Tesla, on the other hand,

563
00:37:50,640 --> 00:37:54,840
even as a young man in his mid 20s,
is thinking about his appearance,

564
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:56,480
how he comes across to people.

565
00:37:56,480 --> 00:37:58,840
So he cares about his clothes,
his manner.

566
00:37:58,840 --> 00:38:02,120
Indeed, he even cares about
how his photograph,

567
00:38:02,120 --> 00:38:03,440
his portraits are taken,
568
00:38:03,440 --> 00:38:07,000
and he always wants to make sure
he has a nice, three-quarter profile

569
00:38:07,000 --> 00:38:10,040
so you don't see the fact
that he has a bit of a pointy chin.

570
00:38:12,480 --> 00:38:15,600
The life and death of Nikola Tesla

571
00:38:15,600 --> 00:38:19,360
is one of the most fascinating
yet tragic stories

572
00:38:19,360 --> 00:38:23,320
of scientific brilliance,
cut-throat business,

573
00:38:23,320 --> 00:38:26,440
and shocking
public relations stunts.

574
00:38:29,520 --> 00:38:32,160
The American public
may have been wowed

575
00:38:32,160 --> 00:38:35,360
by Edison's new direct current
power stations,

576
00:38:35,360 --> 00:38:37,400
but Tesla was less impressed.

577
00:38:37,400 --> 00:38:43,440
He had a dream electricity could be
transmitted across entire cities.
578
00:38:43,440 --> 00:38:45,800
Or even nations.

579
00:38:45,800 --> 00:38:48,440
And he believed he knew
how it could be done -

580
00:38:48,440 --> 00:38:53,000
by using a different type
of electric current.

581
00:38:57,880 --> 00:39:01,840
Electrical experts knew
that the smaller the current

582
00:39:01,840 --> 00:39:06,400
sent down a cable, the smaller the
losses in it through resistance.

583
00:39:06,400 --> 00:39:09,440
And so the longer the cable
could be.

584
00:39:09,440 --> 00:39:14,560
Tesla proposed using a method
of transmitting electricity

585
00:39:14,560 --> 00:39:17,400
where the currents could be lowered
without a fall

586
00:39:17,400 --> 00:39:20,080
in the amount of electrical power
at the other end.

587
00:39:20,080 --> 00:39:22,760
It was called alternating current.
588
00:39:24,200 --> 00:39:27,720
Alternating current is exactly that.

589
00:39:27,720 --> 00:39:30,560
It's an electric current that
alternates

590
00:39:30,560 --> 00:39:32,840
between moving in one direction,

591
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:35,760
then the opposite direction,
very quickly.

592
00:39:35,760 --> 00:39:40,120
As opposed to a direct current,
which moves only in one direction.

593
00:39:40,120 --> 00:39:43,880
Tesla was interested
in alternating current because,

594
00:39:43,880 --> 00:39:47,600
like other electrical engineers
in the late 1880s,

595
00:39:47,600 --> 00:39:51,520
he realised that as you
raise the voltage of any current

596
00:39:51,520 --> 00:39:54,440
that you transmit
from point A to point B,

597
00:39:54,440 --> 00:39:58,000
it's going to be more efficient
to have a higher voltage.

598
00:39:59,200 --> 00:40:03,920
And since the amount of electric
power in a cable is its voltage

599
00:40:03,920 --> 00:40:07,600
multiplied by its current,
increasing the voltage,

600
00:40:07,600 --> 00:40:10,120
meant the current in the cables
could be reduced,

601
00:40:10,120 --> 00:40:14,320
and so losses due to resistance
would be less.

602
00:40:14,320 --> 00:40:17,240
However, you don't want
very high voltages

603
00:40:17,240 --> 00:40:21,040
on the order of, say, 20,000 volts
coming into your home.

604
00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:22,800
So you need to step down the current

605
00:40:22,800 --> 00:40:25,720
that is being transmitted
over distance into your home.

606
00:40:25,720 --> 00:40:29,760
And to do that,
you need a converter or transformer.

607
00:40:29,760 --> 00:40:34,160
Alternating current
allows you to use a transformer

608
00:40:34,160 --> 00:40:37,040
to make that switch
from the high transmission voltage

609
00:40:37,040 --> 00:40:40,240
to the lower voltage
you're going to use at consumption.

610
00:40:42,960 --> 00:40:46,720
Perfecting the technology
to transmit electricity

611
00:40:46,720 --> 00:40:50,240
hundreds of miles
from where it was generated

612
00:40:50,240 --> 00:40:53,440
would mark a huge step
towards the modern world.

613
00:40:54,560 --> 00:40:57,920
And a wealthy
industrial entrepreneur

614
00:40:57,920 --> 00:41:00,160
was already developing
the solution.

615
00:41:00,160 --> 00:41:03,680
His name was George Westinghouse.

616
00:41:03,680 --> 00:41:06,920
Westinghouse believed alternating
currents was the future,

617
00:41:06,920 --> 00:41:10,040
but it had a big drawback.

618
00:41:10,040 --> 00:41:12,920
While it was fine
for electric light,

619
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:14,600
unlike direct current,

620
00:41:14,600 --> 00:41:18,040
there was no practical motor
that could run on it.

621
00:41:18,040 --> 00:41:21,320
And no-one believed
there ever would be.

622
00:41:21,320 --> 00:41:23,560
Apart from Nikola Tesla.

623
00:41:24,560 --> 00:41:26,920
Tesla, as an inventor, liked to say

624
00:41:26,920 --> 00:41:31,040
that the first thing you need to do
is not to build something,

625
00:41:31,040 --> 00:41:34,400
but to imagine it,
to think it through, to plan it.

626
00:41:34,400 --> 00:41:38,120
And he had what modern-day
psychologists would call

627
00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:40,480
an eidetic memory. He could basically

628
00:41:40,480 --> 00:41:42,400
remember everything that he saw
629
00:41:42,400 --> 00:41:45,000
and then visualise it
in three dimensions.

630
00:41:45,000 --> 00:41:48,000
And they often say
people that have this skill

631
00:41:48,000 --> 00:41:50,240
see it about an arm's length away,

632
00:41:50,240 --> 00:41:53,680
out here, and they see it in
three dimensions in that space.

633
00:41:53,680 --> 00:41:56,640
And all the indications are
that Tesla had that ability.

634
00:42:00,880 --> 00:42:04,240
This is a Tesla egg.

635
00:42:06,360 --> 00:42:08,800
It's a replica of the one Tesla used

636
00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:11,920
to demonstrate
his greatest breakthrough

637
00:42:11,920 --> 00:42:16,040
and one of the most important
inventions of all time.

638
00:42:16,040 --> 00:42:18,800
It showed how rotary movement

639
00:42:18,800 --> 00:42:22,600
can be produced directly
from an alternating current.

640
00:42:22,600 --> 00:42:26,520
Crucially, one that could be
generated thousands of miles away.

641
00:42:26,520 --> 00:42:30,240
This was something
that had never been done before.

642
00:42:38,440 --> 00:42:41,840
When Tesla was working on
the alternating current motor,

643
00:42:41,840 --> 00:42:43,080
he was thinking big.

644
00:42:43,080 --> 00:42:46,120
He was not just
tinkering with one component

645
00:42:46,120 --> 00:42:49,840
of the motor and saying, "Gee, if
I can make that a little bit better,

646
00:42:49,840 --> 00:42:52,640
"it will work out."
He's actually thinking about

647
00:42:52,640 --> 00:42:56,480
an entire system that involves
the generator,

648
00:42:56,480 --> 00:42:58,280
the wires to the motor

649
00:42:58,280 --> 00:43:00,840
and the motor itself.
He's a complete maverick,
650
00:43:00,840 --> 00:43:03,080
thinking outside the box,

651
00:43:03,080 --> 00:43:06,480
doing things very differently
to his fellow inventors.

652
00:43:06,480 --> 00:43:09,800
Tesla's solution was ingenious.

653
00:43:09,800 --> 00:43:13,640
He fed more than one alternating
current into his motor

654
00:43:13,640 --> 00:43:17,520
and timed them so that they followed
in sequence with each other.

655
00:43:17,520 --> 00:43:20,280
The first alternating current

656
00:43:20,280 --> 00:43:24,000
energised a coil of wire
inside the motor,

657
00:43:24,000 --> 00:43:26,760
creating an electromagnetic field

658
00:43:26,760 --> 00:43:30,920
which attracted the motor's
central moving part to it

659
00:43:30,920 --> 00:43:32,160
and then faded.

660
00:43:32,160 --> 00:43:36,200
The second overlapping current
fed the next coil,

661
00:43:36,200 --> 00:43:40,600
dragging the moving part around
further, before it faded.

662
00:43:40,600 --> 00:43:43,800
And the same for the third coil
and the fourth.

663
00:43:43,800 --> 00:43:47,480
The result was a revolving
magnetic field,

664
00:43:47,480 --> 00:43:50,240
strong enough to make the motor,

665
00:43:50,240 --> 00:43:52,720
or in this case his egg, spin.

666
00:43:52,720 --> 00:43:56,880
Tesla designed an entire
electrical system around this

667
00:43:56,880 --> 00:43:59,280
called polyphase transmission.

668
00:43:59,280 --> 00:44:02,320
This meant a noisy
and smelly power station,

669
00:44:02,320 --> 00:44:05,720
generating lots of useful
alternating current,

670
00:44:05,720 --> 00:44:09,120
could now be situated
away from populated areas.
671
00:44:10,680 --> 00:44:13,760
And for the first time
you can build large power stations

672
00:44:13,760 --> 00:44:15,920
wherever you want.
On the edge of town,

673
00:44:15,920 --> 00:44:17,520
or a waterfall like Niagara,

674
00:44:17,520 --> 00:44:20,160
and distribute the power
over long distances,

675
00:44:20,160 --> 00:44:22,320
and serve all the people

676
00:44:22,320 --> 00:44:25,920
in a major city
or metropolitan centre.

677
00:44:25,920 --> 00:44:30,440
Tesla's breakthrough
was the last piece of the jigsaw,

678
00:44:30,440 --> 00:44:33,120
but he still had to convince
the world

679
00:44:33,120 --> 00:44:35,200
that his solution was better

680
00:44:35,200 --> 00:44:39,160
than the direct current method
championed by Edison.
681
00:44:43,960 --> 00:44:48,600
Edison continued to roll out
his direct current system,

682
00:44:48,600 --> 00:44:51,840
building power stations
across New York state.

683
00:44:55,400 --> 00:44:59,000
But then Tesla met
George Westinghouse -

684
00:44:59,000 --> 00:45:03,160
the man who could
make his dreams into a reality.

685
00:45:05,200 --> 00:45:10,000
In July 1888, Westinghouse
made an offer for Tesla's patents,

686
00:45:10,000 --> 00:45:13,240
which has become part
of the mystery and folklore

687
00:45:13,240 --> 00:45:16,120
surrounding the whole
Nikola Tesla story,

688
00:45:16,120 --> 00:45:20,240
where it's difficult
to separate fact from fiction.

689
00:45:21,800 --> 00:45:26,880
Tesla was paid 75,000
for his alternating current patents

690
00:45:26,880 --> 00:45:29,280
and offered 2.50
691
00:45:29,280 --> 00:45:32,240
for every horse power
his motors would generate.

692
00:45:32,240 --> 00:45:35,560
This should have guaranteed
him vast wealth

693
00:45:35,560 --> 00:45:39,240
for the rest of his life
but that isn't what happened.

694
00:45:42,120 --> 00:45:44,640
It's clear to us now
that at the time,

695
00:45:44,640 --> 00:45:47,240
the AC system
was a much better method

696
00:45:47,240 --> 00:45:49,640
of transmitting electric power.

697
00:45:49,640 --> 00:45:52,240
And you'd think that with Tesla's
breakthroughs,

698
00:45:52,240 --> 00:45:57,120
nothing could stand in the way
of the success of AC over DC.

699
00:45:57,120 --> 00:46:00,120
But one man still believed totally

700
00:46:00,120 --> 00:46:02,680
in his direct current inventions,

701
00:46:02,680 --> 00:46:06,280
From the filaments of the bulbs
to the switches,

702
00:46:06,280 --> 00:46:07,960
sockets and generators,

703
00:46:07,960 --> 00:46:11,520
and he wasn't about to waste
millions of dollars

704
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:13,680
on changing them.

705
00:46:13,680 --> 00:46:16,280
Edison.

706
00:46:17,280 --> 00:46:19,440
The battle lines were drawn.

707
00:46:19,440 --> 00:46:23,200
Westinghouse and Tesla
went toe-to-toe with Edison

708
00:46:23,200 --> 00:46:26,720
for New York's lucrative
lighting contracts.

709
00:46:26,720 --> 00:46:29,520
Two completely different systems

710
00:46:29,520 --> 00:46:32,720
battling it out
for one ultimate prize -

711
00:46:32,720 --> 00:46:37,760
the chance to light up America
and then the world.
712
00:46:37,760 --> 00:46:41,640
It would become known as
the War of the Currents.

713
00:46:45,000 --> 00:46:48,800
Both camps tried to undercut
each other on cost,

714
00:46:48,800 --> 00:46:52,280
but Edison believed
his beloved direct current

715
00:46:52,280 --> 00:46:56,240
was better than alternating current
because it was safer.

716
00:46:58,320 --> 00:47:02,400
Touching an Edison cable,
with its low voltage,

717
00:47:02,400 --> 00:47:04,560
was painful but relatively harmless.

718
00:47:04,560 --> 00:47:06,680
Whereas alternating current cables

719
00:47:06,680 --> 00:47:10,320
carried a much higher voltage

720
00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:13,400
and touching them could be deadly.

721
00:47:13,400 --> 00:47:16,680
So, what Edison was trying to do

722
00:47:16,680 --> 00:47:22,080
was to again define his DC system
as the safe system.
723
00:47:22,080 --> 00:47:26,520
It's better than
electric street arc lights,

724
00:47:26,520 --> 00:47:28,320
it's better than gas,

725
00:47:28,320 --> 00:47:31,880
and it's now better than high
voltage AC incandescent lighting.

726
00:47:31,880 --> 00:47:34,880
Right? It's the system that's safe.

727
00:47:34,880 --> 00:47:38,160
You adopt the Edison system,
you can be sure it's safe.

728
00:47:41,080 --> 00:47:42,880
Edison claimed that AC

729
00:47:42,880 --> 00:47:46,360
was a more dangerous type
of current than DC

730
00:47:46,360 --> 00:47:50,000
and he highlighted every accident
to Westinghouse's workmen

731
00:47:50,000 --> 00:47:53,920
and every fire caused
by short circuits.

732
00:47:58,080 --> 00:48:01,680
It was a potent message
because in the 1880s,
733
00:48:01,680 --> 00:48:05,640
many people were still terrified
by electricity.

734
00:48:05,640 --> 00:48:09,960
It could shock and even kill
in an instant

735
00:48:09,960 --> 00:48:13,840
and the reasons why still
weren't fully understood.

736
00:48:13,840 --> 00:48:18,120
For many, the idea of piping this
invisible killer into their homes

737
00:48:18,120 --> 00:48:19,920
was utterly ludicrous.

738
00:48:22,920 --> 00:48:27,920
So the weapon used in the
War of the Currents was fear.

739
00:48:31,600 --> 00:48:34,600
And a little-known
electrical engineer,

740
00:48:34,600 --> 00:48:36,520
Harold P. Brown,

741
00:48:36,520 --> 00:48:39,360
was about to take the fight
against AC

742
00:48:39,360 --> 00:48:41,640
to a whole new level.

743
00:48:44,600 --> 00:48:48,000
It was to prove
one of the most extreme

744
00:48:48,000 --> 00:48:51,360
and negative publicity campaigns
in history.

745
00:48:51,360 --> 00:48:56,160
Brown had devised
a unique and theatrical way

746
00:48:56,160 --> 00:48:59,680
of demonstrating
the deadly power of AC...

747
00:49:00,880 --> 00:49:03,960
..and he was eager to share it
with the world.

748
00:49:03,960 --> 00:49:09,320
So, on a warm summer's evening,
in July 1888,

749
00:49:09,320 --> 00:49:12,600
he gathered together
75 of the country's

750
00:49:12,600 --> 00:49:15,960
top electrical engineers
and reporters

751
00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:19,920
to witness a spectacle
they would never forget.

752
00:49:24,400 --> 00:49:28,400
Brown's plan was extremely macabre.

753
00:49:28,400 --> 00:49:30,360
He'd paid a team of street urchins

754
00:49:30,360 --> 00:49:33,440
to collect together stray dogs
roaming Manhattan.

755
00:49:33,440 --> 00:49:36,760
Out on stage, he addressed
his audience.

756
00:49:36,760 --> 00:49:39,640
"I have asked you here, gentlemen,

757
00:49:39,640 --> 00:49:44,040
"to witness the experimental
application of electricity

758
00:49:44,040 --> 00:49:47,120
"to a number of brutes."

759
00:49:48,200 --> 00:49:52,560
His demonstration involved
electrocuting the dogs...

760
00:49:52,560 --> 00:49:54,840
with DC and AC power,

761
00:49:54,840 --> 00:50:01,000
in an attempt to show that AC
current killed them more quickly.

762
00:50:01,000 --> 00:50:04,040
And it wasn't just dogs.

763
00:50:04,040 --> 00:50:08,520
Brown went on to make public
spectacles of killing a calf
764
00:50:08,520 --> 00:50:09,920
and even a horse.

765
00:50:11,160 --> 00:50:14,680
And he moved from dogs
to larger animals for a reason.

766
00:50:14,680 --> 00:50:19,680
He wanted to show that the AC form
of electricity was so dangerous

767
00:50:19,680 --> 00:50:23,480
it could kill any large mammal,
including humans.

768
00:50:32,440 --> 00:50:38,040
Brown's animal experiments
had persuaded American politicians

769
00:50:38,040 --> 00:50:42,360
the most humane method of executing
condemned criminals

770
00:50:42,360 --> 00:50:44,440
should be with alternating current,

771
00:50:44,440 --> 00:50:46,960
generated by Westinghouse machines.

772
00:50:48,360 --> 00:50:52,160
Edison's lawyers even suggested
a new term

773
00:50:52,160 --> 00:50:56,080
to describe being electrocuted
in this way...

774
00:50:56,080 --> 00:50:58,080
..to be Westinghoused.

775
00:50:59,480 --> 00:51:02,160
And at precisely 6:32,

776
00:51:02,160 --> 00:51:07,240
on the morning of 6th August 1890,

777
00:51:07,240 --> 00:51:10,080
a 45-year-old man, William Kemmler,

778
00:51:10,080 --> 00:51:12,200
was strapped to a wooden chair

779
00:51:12,200 --> 00:51:14,640
and two soaking wet electrodes

780
00:51:14,640 --> 00:51:17,000
were carefully attached to him.

781
00:51:17,000 --> 00:51:21,160
And as 26 officials and doctors
looked on from an adjoining room,

782
00:51:21,160 --> 00:51:25,080
Kemmler said goodbye to the
prison chaplain and waited.

783
00:51:30,320 --> 00:51:32,160
The execution of William Kemmler

784
00:51:32,160 --> 00:51:36,400
marked the lowest point
in the War of the Currents,

785
00:51:36,400 --> 00:51:39,080
but it wouldn't quite mark the end.
786
00:51:39,080 --> 00:51:42,200
Because Nikola Tesla
was about to do something

787
00:51:42,200 --> 00:51:44,160
that had never been seen before.

788
00:51:44,160 --> 00:51:46,840
Something so wondrous and daring

789
00:51:46,840 --> 00:51:50,720
that it would live on for ever
in the memories of those who saw it.

790
00:52:14,040 --> 00:52:17,040
Tesla had been developing a method

791
00:52:17,040 --> 00:52:20,280
of generating very high frequency
alternating currents

792
00:52:20,280 --> 00:52:22,000
and on May 21st 1891,

793
00:52:22,000 --> 00:52:25,480
at a meeting of top
electrical engineers,

794
00:52:25,480 --> 00:52:27,240
he demonstrated it.

795
00:52:33,760 --> 00:52:38,280
In an almost magical display
of awesome power and wonder,

796
00:52:38,280 --> 00:52:41,600
and without wearing any
safety chain mail or mask,

797
00:52:41,600 --> 00:52:46,120
tens of thousands of volts,
produced by a Tesla coil,

798
00:52:46,120 --> 00:52:51,600
passed across his body and through
the end of a lamp he was holding.

799
00:52:56,600 --> 00:53:01,600
Tesla's alternating current
was at such a high frequency,

800
00:53:01,600 --> 00:53:03,560
that it passed through his body

801
00:53:03,560 --> 00:53:06,320
without causing serious harm
or even pain.

802
00:53:07,400 --> 00:53:10,920
His demonstrations showed
that if handled correctly,

803
00:53:10,920 --> 00:53:15,840
alternating current at extremely
high voltages could be safe.

804
00:53:16,960 --> 00:53:20,000
The War of the Currents
had been won,

805
00:53:20,000 --> 00:53:22,360
by Westinghouse and Tesla.

806
00:53:22,360 --> 00:53:28,040
In 1896, the new power station
was completed at Niagara Falls,

807
00:53:28,040 --> 00:53:30,160
using Westinghouse AC generators

808
00:53:30,160 --> 00:53:33,760
to produce Tesla's
polyphase current.

809
00:53:33,760 --> 00:53:36,640
Finally, huge amounts of power

810
00:53:36,640 --> 00:53:40,080
could be transmitted from the Falls,

811
00:53:40,080 --> 00:53:42,920
to nearby Buffalo and then,
a few years later,

812
00:53:42,920 --> 00:53:48,280
the Niagara plant was providing
power to New York City itself.

813
00:53:48,280 --> 00:53:53,240
And today, almost all of the
electricity generated in the world

814
00:53:53,240 --> 00:53:56,280
is done so using Tesla's system.

815
00:54:03,600 --> 00:54:07,800
But Tesla's story
doesn't end in fame and fortune.

816
00:54:10,480 --> 00:54:13,880
Although he went on to make
significant contributions
817
00:54:13,880 --> 00:54:16,720
to many other areas of science
and invention,

818
00:54:16,720 --> 00:54:21,520
to save George Westinghouse from
ruin, after a stock market crash,

819
00:54:21,520 --> 00:54:23,920
he gave up his claim
to the royalties

820
00:54:23,920 --> 00:54:26,120
from his polyphase inventions.

821
00:54:29,640 --> 00:54:34,160
Nikola Tesla was a uniquely talented
man and we owe him so much.

822
00:54:34,160 --> 00:54:36,880
But he was also hugely complicated,

823
00:54:36,880 --> 00:54:40,280
and sadly, later in life,
he became more and more troubled.

824
00:54:40,280 --> 00:54:42,960
He was fixated
with the number three,

825
00:54:42,960 --> 00:54:45,320
counting it out loud
while he walked,

826
00:54:45,320 --> 00:54:49,040
and he developed strange phobias
with germs

827
00:54:49,040 --> 00:54:52,040
and with women wearing
pearl jewellery.

828
00:54:53,640 --> 00:54:58,440
In many ways, his brilliant mind
simply spun out of control.

829
00:55:01,440 --> 00:55:03,720
As Tesla's life unravelled,

830
00:55:03,720 --> 00:55:05,400
he withdrew from people

831
00:55:05,400 --> 00:55:08,240
and found emotional comfort
elsewhere.

832
00:55:08,240 --> 00:55:10,560
He became obsessed with pigeons

833
00:55:10,560 --> 00:55:14,680
and was regularly seen feeding them
here in Bryant Park,

834
00:55:14,680 --> 00:55:16,280
in the centre of Manhattan.

835
00:55:16,280 --> 00:55:20,280
He even fell in love with one
particularly unusual white bird

836
00:55:20,280 --> 00:55:22,520
and when it died,

837
00:55:22,520 --> 00:55:24,680
he was left heart broken.
838
00:55:35,480 --> 00:55:40,560
As an old man, Tesla was left
almost bankrupt and alone,

839
00:55:40,560 --> 00:55:44,840
living as a semi-recluse
in this hotel.

840
00:55:51,640 --> 00:55:58,040
His last years were spent here
in room 3327 of the New York Hotel,

841
00:55:58,040 --> 00:56:00,880
sad, confused, destitute.

842
00:56:06,400 --> 00:56:11,000
Edison went on
to become an American hero

843
00:56:11,000 --> 00:56:15,080
and his company would form
part of General Electric,

844
00:56:15,080 --> 00:56:20,040
even today one of the world's
biggest multinational corporations.

845
00:56:21,560 --> 00:56:28,320
In January 1943, the story of
Nikola Tesla was coming to an end.

846
00:56:30,360 --> 00:56:34,720
But looking out across the Manhattan
skyline for the very last time,

847
00:56:34,720 --> 00:56:38,600
he saw a sky lit up
with twinkling lights,
848
00:56:38,600 --> 00:56:42,920
and a million lives
transformed by his genius.

849
00:56:59,440 --> 00:57:02,480
The ability to generate
and transmit electricity,

850
00:57:02,480 --> 00:57:05,480
and the invention of machines
to use it,

851
00:57:05,480 --> 00:57:10,000
have changed our world in ways
we couldn't possibly have imagined.

852
00:57:11,320 --> 00:57:15,440
We can now generate billions
of watts of electricity

853
00:57:15,440 --> 00:57:18,360
every second, every hour, every day.

854
00:57:19,760 --> 00:57:23,760
And whether we do it
using coal, gas,

855
00:57:23,760 --> 00:57:25,720
or nuclear fission,

856
00:57:25,720 --> 00:57:27,160
power stations all rely

857
00:57:27,160 --> 00:57:32,800
on the principles discovered
and developed by Michael Faraday,

858
00:57:32,800 --> 00:57:34,480
Nikola Tesla,

859
00:57:34,480 --> 00:57:37,080
and all the other early
electrical engineers

860
00:57:37,080 --> 00:57:39,960
from an amazing age of invention.

861
00:57:39,960 --> 00:57:43,080
We now take electricity for granted

862
00:57:43,080 --> 00:57:49,040
and have forgotten how magical
and mysterious a force it once was.

863
00:57:49,040 --> 00:57:51,760
But there's something
we should never forget.

864
00:57:51,760 --> 00:57:56,520
Today, without it, the modern world
would collapse around us

865
00:57:56,520 --> 00:58:00,400
and our lives would be very,
very different.

866
00:58:06,600 --> 00:58:10,520
In the next episode, we tell
of the electrical revelations

867
00:58:10,520 --> 00:58:14,120
that led to a revolution
in our understanding

868
00:58:14,120 --> 00:58:16,400
of this amazing force.
869
00:58:19,560 --> 00:58:23,240
To find out more
about the story of electricity,

870
00:58:23,240 --> 00:58:25,400
and to put your power knowledge
to the test,

871
00:58:25,400 --> 00:58:29,400
try the Open University's
interactive energy game.

872
00:58:29,400 --> 00:58:31,920
Go to:

873
00:58:34,560 --> 00:58:37,040
And follow links
to the Open University.

874
00:58:59,040 --> 00:59:02,560
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd 2011

875
00:59:02,560 --> 00:59:05,640
E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk