Power Brokers

Thomas Edison founds the Edison Electric Illumination Company, the first distributor of electric power. The first city given electric power by Edison's company is New York, New York. It is switched on for the first time on September 4th, 1882, providing 110 volts of Edison's Direct Current (DC) system to 59 customers on Manhattan Island.

Enter The Genius

George Westinghouse hires the Serbian-American inventor and physicist Nikola Tesla onto his company as a consultant. Tesla holds a Grudge against Edison for refusing to pay him for a series of inventions he gave to Edison's company some years earlier, and takes revenge by inventing for Westinghouse. His ingenious AC motor designs and groundbreaking theories on the behavior of electricity intensify the rivalry between the two companies, in what is now known as the Current Wars.

A Challenger Arises

George Westinghouse founds the Westinghouse Electric Company, Later to become the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing company. Instead of the traditional Direct Current system, whose constant flow of charge wasted power and had a limited transmission distance, Westinghouse focused on Alternating Current, or AC, whose charge flow is modulated, saving transmission costs. Westinghouse and Edison become quick rivals.