Electricity is not an invention - electricity as a natural phenomenon
Electricity there is always, it is a natural phenomenon. It was discovered early and is closely related to another natural phenomenon, the magnetism.
- Already in the year 1672 the German physicist Otto von Guericke constructed an electrical machine: He had a sulphur ball and rubbed it in his hands. The result is that The electric charge shown by a light.
- Since 1752, we know, thanks to Benjamin Franklin's kite experiment that lightning strikes are caused by anything other than by natural electricity.
- Alessandro Volta built in 1772, the first battery, in electricity through a chemical reaction was produced. According to him, the unit of measurement of electrical voltage is named. How a battery works, know you in another post.
- André Marie Ampère explored the connection between magnetism and electricity in 1820. He is the namesake of the unit of the voltage.
- With the industrial Revolution, electricity was used in everyday life, however, initially only for the illumination of streets.
- After Joseph Wilson Swan in 1878 invented the carbon filament lamp, moved the electric light in private households.
- Werner von Siemens was a Pioneer in terms of electrification and the use of electricity to drive machines. His Patent on his Dynamo machine goes back to the year 1866. Without this machine, the electric motor would have been scarcely developed. How a Dynamo works, we explain in another article.
- An extensive power grid, it was not at that time. It was also at that time, still uses DC and not AC, as we use it today.
Power plants today produce the necessary energy and electricity (image: Pixabay)
History of electricity: direct current is alternating current
In 1881, an invention made it possible to transport electricity over long distances: The transformer.
- This was not in Thomas Edison's mind, was patented in 1880, his carbon filament lamps and even power plants for its regional held equal power networks.
- The entrepreneur George Westinghouse, Edison's rival, built in 1886 power networks with alternating current. However, he had no Patent for the manufacture of light bulbs. He invented the Westinghouse Stopper Lamp, to be network licensed light bulbs offer.
- When a snow storm came in 1888 in New York in the event of a death, as power lines were damaged highly. Now the topic of safety came up in connection with current and direct current came into disrepute.
- In the same year, New York introduced the death penalty by the electric chair and Edison's company got the contract for the development. This was operated with alternating current as dangerous to brand.
- Westinghouse did not, however, get to and resisted. Finally, he received the order to supply the world exhibition in Chicago in 1893 with electricity. Finally, the AC was able to prevail, then, in 1896, with the port Buffalo to the power grid.
History of electricity in Germany
In the 1880s, the electrification started in Germany.
- The first electric street lights were taken in 1882 in Berlin in operation. A total of 36 lanterns lit up the Potsdamer Platz and the Leipziger Straße with electricity.
- In the years from 1890, the electricity held up in other areas of the catchment, for example, with the first electric trams.
- Private households used electricity on a large scale until the 1920s.
The light bulb is the Symbol for the story of electricity (image: Pixabay)
We use it every day and around-the-clock electricity. Where the electricity comes from , we show you why in the next post.
