Tuesday, 02 January 2024 12:17 GMT

Nikola Tesla Signed Holograph Page From A Scientific Article In 1907 Will Be Auctioned April 30Th


(MENAFN- ForPressRelease) Coral Gables, FL, USA, April 19, 2026 -- A holograph page from a Nikola Tesla scientific manuscript from 1907, signed in full and containing Tesla's bold vision of a world in which warfare is rendered virtually obsolete, is the expected headliner in One of a Kind Collectibles' internet-only auction, online now at and ending Thursday, April 30, at 8pm Eastern Time.

Officially titled Tesla, Einstein & the American Presidency: Rare Autographs & Historical Documents, the auction showcases an exceptional array of scientific, presidential, literary and aviation material spanning centuries of American and international history. Offerings in the catalog pertain to items signed by some of history's brightest luminaries, including Tesla, Albert Einstein, Charles Lindbergh, numerous past US Presidents and Declaration signers.

The Nikola Tesla signed manuscript is arguably one of the most audacious weapons concepts ever committed to paper. It is the concluding page of Tesla's working draft for "Tidal Wave to Make War Impossible," an article he authored that was published in English Mechanic and World of Science on May 3, 1907. Tesla autograph letters and manuscripts are extremely rare.

Tesla describes, in precise engineering terms, a remotely operated vessel weaponized to harness the destructive force of ocean swells against an enemy fleet. The concept was not metaphorical: Tesla calculated that wave action could drive a submerged vessel downward from a height of 75 feet in something approximating free fall, generating an impact force of 60,000 tons against the hull of a warship.

That force, he wrote, was eight times the recoil of the broadside of any battleship then afloat. The vessel, once committed, would sink beneath the surface, never to rise. The weapon was to be guided entirely by remote wireless control: no crew, no pilot, no human presence aboard. It was, in the clearest possible terms, the world's first conceived remotely operated weapon of mass naval destruction, designed more than a century before such systems became reality.

Tesla signed the page in full, "Nikola Tesla," directly below the final sentence, as though formally sealing the argument. The 1907 article was a direct response to the naval arms race then convulsing Europe, published at the moment Britain had just launched HMS Dreadnought and nations were pouring treasure into ever-larger battleships. Tesla's argument was characteristically sweeping: that his telautomaton technology rendered the capital ship obsolete and that remote-controlled tidal wave generators would make war itself impossible.

Unfortunately, the manuscript page is where those ideas reached their written endpoint. The accompanying original period photo, a large-format silver gelatin print depicting an elderly Tesla standing in a corridor, hat and cane in hand, bears a penciled annotation, "16x20 left," while the manuscript page itself is annotated "16x20 right" in the same hand, confirming the two were archived and catalogued together as a matched pair by a prior keeper of the material.

“In more than twenty years of watching the market, I have never seen a Tesla scientific manuscript page come to auction,” said David Gindy of One of a Kind Collectibles.“This is the concluding page of his working draft, written in his own hand, describing what is essentially the world's first conceived remotely operated weapon, a precursor to modern drone warfare by over a century. It is, to the best of my knowledge, unique.” It is lot #1 in the auction.

The very next item – lot #2 – is an Albert Einstein signed and inscribed copy of his book Relativitätstheorie (1920), one of the most consequential scientific books of the 20th Century, in original wrappers.“What makes this extraordinary is the inscription itself,” Gindy said.“Einstein wrote 'Relativitätstheorie. / A. Einstein,' naming his own theory in his hand above his signature. In all my years handling Einstein material, I have never seen him sign with that salutation. It may well be unique.”

Lot #3 is a spectacular, extra-illustrated two-volume first edition of Rufus Wilmot Griswold's The Republican Court; or, American Society in the Days of Washington (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1855). The lavishly bound set is inlaid with original autographs, documents and period engravings of the Founding Generation. Contained within are the signatures of George Washington, (signers) Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, John Dickinson, Charles Carroll of Carrollton and others. The volumes have been magnificently rebound in deep midnight-blue full morocco leather, with gilt page edges throughout.

Also up for bid will be colonial treasures, including a Roger Sherman triple-signature on a 1756 counterfeit prosecution; aviation, including Orville Wright and a Lindbergh TLS; space highlights, to include Apollo astronauts Shepard, Aldrin and Collins, plus Gargarin; literary lots, including Mark Twain and Charles Dickens; and sports items, like Yankees and Joe DiMaggio.

To learn more, or to register and bid now for the April 30th auction, please visit.

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