Seite - 110 - in Nikola Tesla and the Graz Tech

110 The consequences of the revolutionary uprisings of 1848/1849 represented a water shed on the path to the world of today. They brought basic relief and abolition of serfdom, the end of feudal rule, the freeing up of scholarship and teaching, and the liberalisation of trade and industry and industrial capitalism. The second half of the 19th century was influenced by countless funda- mental discoveries in practically all areas of science. Technology experienced the implementation of new scientific knowledge, particularly in the devel- opment of electrical engineering and chemical industries. The possibility of cheap steel production through the development of the Bessemer converter and the Siemens-Martin furnace heralded a new era: Steel replaced iron and, thanks to its extreme load-bearing capacity, allowed the construction of huge structures as well as more powerful (because more load-bearing) machines. Railway, ship and building construction are just some of the buzzwords that represent the triumphal procession of steel, the production volume of which increased fortyfold worldwide between 1870 and 1900. Many fundamental inventions were made during this period, such as Gra- ham Bell’s telephone in 1876, Siemens’ alternating current generator in 1878, Edison’s light bulb in 1879, Otto’s four-stroke engine in 1876, or aspirin as the first synthetic remedy in 1899. Alfred Nobel’s dynamite was not only to be used – as intended – in tun- nelling and mining, because the military soon became interested in this new substance, which soon revolutionised warfare. Graz played a not inconsiderable role in this development through the Uni- versity and the College of Technology which emerged from the Joanneum. Ernst Mach, August Toepler and Ludwig Boltzmann, one of the greatest natural scientists of all time, worked in Graz. Philipp Forchheimer, professor of hydraulic engineering and a walking encyclopaedia of engineering sciences, experienced international resonance with his work, Friedrich Reinitzer discov- ered liquid crystalline properties, Friedrich Emich quantitative inorganic micro- analysis, Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Kohlrausch dedicated himself to the problems of atmospheric electricity and radioactivity, Robert Honold became Viktor Kaplan’s adversary in the field of hydroelectric machines, Richard Zsigmondy, who later won the Nobel Prize, began his pioneering work on glass and porce- lain colours in Graz, August Musger succeeded in inventing slow motion and Otto Nußbaumer the first wireless music transmission.