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Tesla's Egg of Columbus was a device exhibited in the
Westinghouse Electric The Westinghouse Electric Corporation was an American manufacturing company founded in 1886 by George Westinghouse. It was originally named "Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company" and was renamed "Westinghouse Electric Corporation" in ...
display at the 1893 Chicago
World's Columbian Exposition The World's Columbian Exposition (also known as the Chicago World's Fair) was a world's fair held in Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordi ...
to explain the
rotating magnetic field A rotating magnetic field is the resultant magnetic field produced by a system of coils symmetrically placed and supplied with polyphase currents. A rotating magnetic field can be produced by a poly-phase (two or more phases) current or by a singl ...
that drove the new
alternating current Alternating current (AC) is an electric current which periodically reverses direction and changes its magnitude continuously with time in contrast to direct current (DC) which flows only in one direction. Alternating current is the form in whic ...
induction motor An induction motor or asynchronous motor is an AC electric motor in which the electric current in the rotor needed to produce torque is obtained by electromagnetic induction from the magnetic field of the stator winding. An induction mot ...
s designed by inventor
Nikola Tesla Nikola Tesla ( ; ,"Tesla"
''
World's Columbian Exposition The World's Columbian Exposition (also known as the Chicago World's Fair) was a world's fair held in Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordi ...
Westinghouse Electric (who had a large space in the "Electricity Building" devoted to their electrical exhibits) asked Tesla to participate and gave his devices their own exhibit space. The display demonstrated a series of electrical effects related to alternating current, AC generators, and displayed many types of induction motors and explained the rotating magnetic field that drove them. With the fair celebrating the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World, the "Egg of Columbus" exhibit, building on the apocryphal 15th century story of the "
Egg of Columbus An egg of Columbus or Columbus' egg ( it, uovo di Colombo ) refers to a brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple or easy after the fact. The expression refers to an apocryphal story, dating from at least the 16th century, in which it is sai ...
" (where the explorer stood an egg on end by smashing its bottom), is described as going "one better" by using a
magnetic field A magnetic field is a vector field that describes the magnetic influence on moving electric charges, electric currents, and magnetic materials. A moving charge in a magnetic field experiences a force perpendicular to its own velocity and to ...
to stand an egg on end. It presented the viewer with a flat round wooden surface surrounded by a wooden rim. Inside this rim it performed Christopher Columbus's feat by spinning a
copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkis ...
egg, larger than an
ostrich egg The egg of the ostrich (genus ''Struthio'') is the largest of any living bird. The shell has a long history of use by humans as a container and for decorative artwork. The eggs are not commonly eaten. Biology The female common ostrich lays her f ...
, in a
rotating magnetic field A rotating magnetic field is the resultant magnetic field produced by a system of coils symmetrically placed and supplied with polyphase currents. A rotating magnetic field can be produced by a poly-phase (two or more phases) current or by a singl ...
causing it to stand on end on its major axis due to
gyroscopic A gyroscope (from Ancient Greek γῦρος ''gŷros'', "round" and σκοπέω ''skopéō'', "to look") is a device used for measuring or maintaining orientation and angular velocity. It is a spinning wheel or disc in which the axis of rotat ...
action. The display also included round copper balls that seemed to orbit around the edge similar to the way
planet A planet is a large, rounded astronomical body that is neither a star nor its remnant. The best available theory of planet formation is the nebular hypothesis, which posits that an interstellar cloud collapses out of a nebula to create a you ...
s move. Whenever the large rotating magnetic field set up by the Egg of Columbus was turned on it impressed the public by spinning various magnetized metal balls and painted metal disks on the display table and even small disks inside vacuum bulbs placed at some distance around the Electricity Building. Underneath what the public saw was a
toroid In mathematics, a toroid is a surface of revolution with a hole in the middle. The axis of revolution passes through the hole and so does not intersect the surface. For example, when a rectangle is rotated around an axis parallel to one of its ...
al
iron Iron () is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from la, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, right in f ...
core
stator The stator is the stationary part of a rotary system, found in electric generators, electric motors, sirens, mud motors or biological rotors. Energy flows through a stator to or from the rotating component of the system. In an electric mot ...
on which four
electromagnetic coil An electromagnetic coil is an electrical Electrical conductivity, conductor such as a wire in the shape of a wiktionary:coil, coil (spiral or helix). Electromagnetic coils are used in electrical engineering, in applications where electric curre ...
s were wound. The device was powered by a two-phase
alternating current Alternating current (AC) is an electric current which periodically reverses direction and changes its magnitude continuously with time in contrast to direct current (DC) which flows only in one direction. Alternating current is the form in whic ...
source (such as a variable speed
alternator An alternator is an electrical generator that converts mechanical energy to electrical energy in the form of alternating current. For reasons of cost and simplicity, most alternators use a rotating magnetic field with a stationary armature.Go ...
) to create the rotating magnetic field. The device operated on a frequency of 25 to 300
hertz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that on ...
. The ideal operating frequency was described as being between 35 and 40 hertz. The device has been described as being built by Westinghouse engineer Charles F. Scott, who was in charge of development of the induction motor for the company, although a March 1919
Electrical Experimenter ''The Electrical Experimenter'' was an American technical science magazine that was published monthly. It was established in May 1913, as the successor to ''Modern Electrics'', a combination of a magazine and mail-order catalog that had been publ ...
article claimed it was built by Westinghouse Electric Superintendent Albert Schmid. The Columbian Exposition "Egg of Columbus" ended up at Tesla's 46 & 48 East
Houston Street Houston Street ( ) is a major east–west thoroughfare in Lower Manhattan in New York City. It runs the full width of the island of Manhattan, from FDR Drive along the East River in the east to the West Side Highway along the Hudson River in t ...
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
laboratory where he would demonstrate it to visitors. Margaret Cheney's 1981 book '' Tesla: Man Out of Time'' says that after Tesla's death the device was sent to Yugoslavia 1952 along with many other Tesla papers, models and artifacts, becoming part of the collection at the
Nikola Tesla Museum The Nikola Tesla Museum ( sr-cyr, Музеј Николе Тесле, Muzej Nikole Tesle) is a science museum located in the central area of Belgrade, Serbia. It is dedicated to honoring and displaying the life and work of Nikola Tesla as well as ...
in
Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; Names of European cities in different languages: B, names in other languages) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers a ...
although her later 1999 book ''Tesla: Master of Lightning'' seems to indicate that the museum has only a smaller copy.


Alternative origin

An alternative origin for Tesla's "Egg of Columbus" was told by Nikola Tesla himself to the editors of Electrical Experimenter and published in their March, 1919 article "''How Tesla Performed the Feat of Columbus Without Cracking the Egg''". In this version the year of invention was 1887 when "He had approached a Wall Street capitalist — a prominent lawyer — with a view of getting financial support and this gentleman called in a friend of his, a well-known engineer at the head of one of the big corporations in New York, to pass upon the merits of the scheme". At that time these would have been Charles F. Peck and Alfred S. Brown, Tesla's financial backers and partners in the Tesla Electric Company. Tesla's story has him convincing these men that a
rotating magnetic field A rotating magnetic field is the resultant magnetic field produced by a system of coils symmetrically placed and supplied with polyphase currents. A rotating magnetic field can be produced by a poly-phase (two or more phases) current or by a singl ...
AC
induction motor An induction motor or asynchronous motor is an AC electric motor in which the electric current in the rotor needed to produce torque is obtained by electromagnetic induction from the magnetic field of the stator winding. An induction mot ...
would be a feasible invention worth developing via building the "Egg of Columbus" the next day and demonstrating it to them.Richard T. Quick II, Tesla's Egg of Columbus, Addendum, tesla.org
/ref>


Reproductions

Reproductions of the device are displayed at the
Nikola Tesla Museum The Nikola Tesla Museum ( sr-cyr, Музеј Николе Тесле, Muzej Nikole Tesle) is a science museum located in the central area of Belgrade, Serbia. It is dedicated to honoring and displaying the life and work of Nikola Tesla as well as ...
in Belgrade, the Memorial Centre "Nikola Tesla" in
Smiljan Smiljan () is a village in the mountainous region of Western Lika in Croatia. It is located northwest of Gospić, and fifteen kilometers from the Zagreb-Split highway; its population is 418 (2011). Smiljan is the birthplace of inventor and engin ...
, the Technical Museum in
Zagreb Zagreb ( , , , ) is the capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Croatia#List of cities and towns, largest city of Croatia. It is in the Northern Croatia, northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slop ...
, the
Croatian History Museum Croatian History Museum ( hr, Hrvatski povijesni muzej) is a museum of history located in the on Antun Gustav Matoš Street in the historic Gornji Grad district of Zagreb, Croatia. The museum holdings consist of around 300,000 objects divided in ...
in Zagreb, in the
Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum The Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum, located in Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States, specializes in interactive exhibits with the goal of helping both children and adults discover the scientist within them by promoting science literacy through experiment ...
in Ann Arbor, MI, and the
Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe The Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe (also known as TSCW) is a nonprofit organization established to develop a regional science and technology center, museum and makerspace at the site of Nikola Tesla's former Wardenclyffe laboratory on Lon ...
in Shoreham, NY.


References


External links


Tesla's Egg of Columbus. Electrical Experimenter, 1919
– Article describing Tesla's experiment
Replicas of the Egg of ColumbusYoutube demonstrationMIT demonstration
{{Nikola Tesla Induction motors Products introduced in 1893 Eggs in culture World's Columbian Exposition