Tesla next tried to work on his grandfather's clocks. He said that he would take them apart and put them back together, but often was not successful in the latter. (Cheney, 1983).
At the age of five, he moved to Gospic, another city in Croatia. In Gospic, he felt alone because he had moved away from the country and all of his friends and farm animals. One day, though, everything changed. The town had just bought a new fire truck. There was a public display in which the water was supposed to be turned on and sprayed from the hoses. When the time came, the firemen were all assembled, and the water was turned on, but not a drop came out of the hose. Tesla, arriving on the scene, noticed the problem almost immediately. He waded into the river and fixed the hose. He was held high on the shoulders of the townspeople as a hero. (Wise, 1994).
Heroism is not all that Tesla accomplished in Gospic, though. At the age of ten, he enrolled at the Real Gymnasium. It was a fairly new and well-equipped institution. He learned many things there and eventually moved on to the Polytechnic school in Graz, Austria. While attending Graz, he was shown the most up-to-date direct current dynamo. While a professor was demonstrating the dynamo, Tesla asked, "Couldn't this be made to run more efficiently using alternating current?" (Tesla, 1919) The professor and the other students laughed at him. He decided that he did not want to attend that school and dropped out of the Polytechnic. He then started work at the Continental Edison Company in France. He never stopped working on the alternating current system though. He constantly pictured it in his mind. Tesla wrote:.
"My method is different, I do not rush into actual work. When I get an idea I start at once building it up in my imagination. I change the construction, make improvements, and operate the device in my mind. It is absolutely immaterial to me whether I run my turbine in my thought or test it in my shop.
