Nikola Tesla is taken to court by the City of New York to pay $935 in back taxes. Tesla is forced to admit that he earns only about $350 a month, barely enough to cover his daily expenses. The judge asks him, “How do you live?” and he replies, “Mostly on credit.” In November of the previous year, the New York Times had published speculation that Tesla and Edison would receive the Nobel Prize (which would have secured Tesla’s financial well-being), but the famous New York newspaper was wrong.
