Legacy

Among the collection of memorial items are Tesla’s death mask, a posthumous impression of Tesla’s right hand and an urn containing Tesla’s ashes.

On the initiative of Hugo Gernsback, on January 9, 1943, two days after Tesla’s death, F. Moynihan made a death mask of him. The Museum has four casts of the Tesla death mask. The castings of the mask and the posthumous impression of Tesla’s hand were presented with the rest of the legacy to the Museum at its founding in 1952 by Tesla’s nephew and heir, Sava Kosanović.

Tesla died in New York on January 7, 1943. His body was interred in New York’s Ferncliff Cemetery before being cremated in March of the same year. An urn with Tesla’s ashes was taken to Belgrade in 1957. Tesla’s ashes today rest in an urn in the shape of a sphere. The urn, designed by Nebojša Mitrić, stands on a stone pedestal and is exhibited in its own space within the Museum’s permanent exhibition.