You might know about Tesla vs. Edison. In cities, it was Edison vs. Westinghouse.

The story of electric power is a story of urbanization. The major battlefield of the famed “War of Currents”—an electric arms-race and propagandized power struggle between Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla, and George Westinghouse—was Manhattan. But to set the scene, let’s start in Paris, the City of Light.

In 1878, Edison attended the Exposition Universelle, where arc lights powered by electric generators lined the Avenue de l’Opera and the Place de l’Opera. A year later, he unveiled his improvements on the incandescent light bulb. By 1882 he started the Edison Electric Light Company to distribute his low voltage direct current (DC) power to homes—and due to demand from city governments, to the streets as well.

What sparked the idea for Edison to bring electricity into cities when he started his Electric Illuminating Company in 1880?

Electricity was already in cities in a crude form, known as arc lighting. It was very intense and it really couldn’t be used safely except really large spaces, either outdoors or in really large interior spaces. No one had been able to crack the problem of creating some sort of long-lasting incandescent bulb.

Once Edison did that, he had to invent an entire system of delivery—direct current—to use the bulbs inside houses. He did that in New York City, powered by Pearl Street Station in 1882.

The distinguishing aspect of direct current was that you really couldn't economically send electricity much more than about a mile. If you had a power station, you would need another one a mile or two away in order to send power out concentrically from that. In the Edison world of electricity, you would have a power station every couple of miles—these were all coal fired plants.

You can imagine people weren't all that enthused about that. The other important thing about direct current was it could operate motors, and that was important for businesses.

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