Review of "Tesla’s Cottage" by Barbara Daddino

Score: 95/100 (9.5 out of 10)

Could you imagine owning the former home of one of the greatest innovators and intellectuals in history? A man responsible for unleashing alternating current, pioneering wireless communication, and envisioning technologies that would shape the future long before the world was ready to accept them?

In Tesla’s Cottage, Barbara Daddino does more than imagine it—she lives it. This remarkable book is not just a historical account, but an intimate journey through memory, mystery, and the enduring legacy of Nikola Tesla. With the former inventor’s Shoreham residence as both backdrop and central figure, Daddino artfully blends memoir, investigative journalism, and reverent biography to restore Tesla’s humanity—his hopes, solitude, heartbreaks, and brilliance. What results is a deeply personal editorial triumph: a rediscovery of Tesla not just as a genius, but as a man, and the quiet sanctuary he once called home.

Tesla's Cottage is part-history, part-investigative journalism, and part-biography.

Barbara Daddino is not only the author of this book and lead researcher for it, but she is also the legitimate owner of Telsa's old cottage in Shoreham, Long Island—a modest home that once served as the private retreat of Nikola Tesla during one of the most pivotal periods of his life.

This book is the result of years of tireless research, on-site discoveries, and heartfelt dedication. By weaving together archival documents, personal reflections, and architectural insights, she not only makes a compelling case for the cottage’s historical significance but also reintroduces readers to the quieter, more human side of Tesla—the man behind the myth.

Similar to Einstein's Desk by Domenic Melillo & Dr. Robert Melillo, this book dares to explore the workspace of a legendary genius. It's sobering to think that people who changed the world were still human like you and me. They had quirks and eccentricities like you and me. They had weaknesses and vulnerabilities like you and me. They weren't perfect.

Yet history still remembers and idealizes them. These are the men who made history—changed history.

We learned so much from this book! And we were reminded why the name Tesla still holds a nigh-mythical power to this day.

But did you know that this icon of science and technology may have been deliberately targeted by his landlord with BEDBUGS to get rid of him?

That’s just one of the many jaw-dropping, intimate, and oddly humanizing revelations uncovered in this book.

Did you also know that Tesla’s labs burned down twice (in 1895 and 2023 fires at Wardenclyffe)? And did you know that many of his thoughts, ideas, and inventions may have been lost in one of these fires or never written down/documented prior to his death?

So much is left to the imagination and to speculation, and we have but bits and pieces of what he may have been working on. But this book does a great job at wetting our appetite about what those things may have been based on existing info and research.

One of the interesting surprises about this book is how it covers Tesla's associates and contemporaries—people he rubbed shoulders with, lived next to, or feuded with.

Many may be familiar with his feud with Thomas Edison, who is essentially the villain or antagonist in most books about Tesla. The relationship between Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison was marked by admiration turned rivalry—Tesla once worked for Edison, only to break away after clashing over unpaid wages and differing visions of electrical power. Their feud, famously embodied in the "War of Currents," pitted Edison’s direct current (DC) against Tesla’s alternating current (AC), a battle that defined the future of electricity and left a lasting rift between two of history’s greatest inventors. Edison widely took credit and fame as the "father of electricity" despite enormous contributions by Tesla.

How fitting is it that Tesla's alternating current (AC) is the way of the world now? The very system he championed—mocked, dismissed, and nearly buried by his rivals—is now the invisible pulse of modern life, powering everything from homes to hospitals to high-speed trains. It's a quiet triumph that echoes his legacy: revolutionary, essential, and too often uncredited.

Daddino emphasizes that this AC breakthrough made possible the electrification of cities, enabling streetcars, subways, night lighting, elevators, and other hallmarks of urban infrastructure. Your refrigerator, for example, is powered by AC.

Daddino writes, “To put it another way, Tesla’s system made the modern world possible”

Another similar thing can be said about Tesla's views on wireless technology—which he viewed as the future in an era still dominated by cords and wires.

It is safe to say that your cellphones, smartphones, and laptops are partly due to Tesla's imagination, innovation, and ingenuity coming to fruition. At the very least, they reflect ideas that he championed long before they were possible or plausible, namely wireless technology.

Daddino’s work gently reminds us that Tesla was not just ahead of his time—he was outside of it, seeing a world that had yet to exist and tirelessly working to bring it into being. From wireless power to remote control, from Earth resonance to global communication networks, many of the technologies that define our lives today were once dismissed as fantasies—until Tesla imagined them first.

You know who he reminded us of? Leonardo da Vinci. Both were not just inventors—they were visionaries. Da Vinci dreamed of flying machines and helicopters long before the technology existed to make them real. Tesla imagined wireless energy, global communication, and even Earth resonance transmission before modern infrastructure could catch up. Their ideas often extended far beyond the understanding of their own time.

Many understand Da Vinci's contributions to the world, but not nearly as many know of Tesla's, and it's a shame. Thankfully, this book (and a particular car brand) help to change that.

Going back to the interesting people that Tesla knew and interacted with beside Edison...

This included J.P. Morgan, the powerful financier who initially funded Tesla’s Wardenclyffe project—only to later withdraw his support, contributing to one of the most devastating setbacks in Tesla’s career. There was also Katharine Johnson, the wife of editor Robert Underwood Johnson, who was not only a close friend but a woman of intellect and social grace, often cited as Tesla’s emotional confidante.

Tesla also knew and admired Elsie Janis, an actress and suffragette, whose independence and charisma reflected the kind of strong, visionary women Tesla quietly respected. He rubbed shoulders with literary icons like Mark Twain, who delighted in Tesla’s experiments and considered him a kindred spirit. These relationships, many of them touched on in Tesla’s Cottage, reveal a different side of Tesla—not just the inventor, but the man who connected deeply with artists, reformers, and idealists who, like him, were reshaping the world in their own right.

But perhaps the most interesting and touching relationship he had was with his investor and business partner, George Westinghouse, a man who was willing to fund his projects when no one else would.

However, it goes both ways.
Tesla bailed Westinghouse out of a very tough situation, tearing up the original royalty contract to help Westinghouse avoid bankruptcy.

Tesla told Westinghouse, "You have been my friend. You believed in me when others did not. You have been brave enough to go ahead... You will not suffer because of me."

This effectively cost Tesla millions in royalties, but it saved his friend and truest believer from financial ruin.

This really goes to show how unselfish Tesla was. He wasn't in it for money, he was in it to make the world a better place.

Yes, we get insights into his many patent battles, but that was more regarding rightful credit and ownership rather than a desire for fame or fortune.

Oh, and this book covers the other cool and strange tech that Tesla either thought of or invented including the Wardenclyffe Tower (intended to be the centerpiece of a global wireless communication and power transmission system) and the infamous "death ray" which was intended to stop/discourage war, not enhance it.

Are you ready to learn more than you ever have before about Tesla?

Check it out on Amazon!