Wardenclyffe: Tesla’s Only Remaining Laboratory with Karl Grossman, Chief Investigative Reporter, WVVH-TV News In 1901, Tesla purchased 200 acres on Long Island’s north shore from James Warden. These 200 acres were part of an 1800 acre potato farm along what is today Route 25A in Shoreham, NY. The site became known as Wardenclyffe, after the former owner. Here, Tesla established what would become his only remaining laboratory building. Here, in Shoreham on Long Island that at the turn into the last century, the great inventor Nikola Tesla built a tower with which he hoped to transmit electric power through the air to anywhere in the world. The purpose of the Wardenclyffe laboratory was the establishment of a wireless telegraphy plant. The prestigious architectural firm of McKin, Mead, and White was contracted to design the laboratory and transmitter tower (187 feet high above ground and 120 feet deep below ground level). Stanford White became the architect for the building. Tesla’s plan had the initial backing of the financier JP Morgan. The red brick laboratory building can still be seen on the north side of Route 25A between the intersection of Randall Road and the Shoreham Fire Department. During the last week of July 1903, residents around the Shoreham site experienced what was to be the only testing of Tesla’s equipment at this facility. Several days after these tests, his dream was destroyed when creditors from Westinghouse confiscated his heavier equipment for …
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