Homage to a genius mind - The Technical Museum named after Nikola Tesla

Zagreb’s Technical Museum now bears the name of Nikola Tesla, which is expected to soon be officially registered. Apart from the new name, the museum will also receive a new visual identity in order to mark the 159th anniversary of the birth of the great scientist.

Until October 16th, the Technical Museum, which will soon officially be renamed after Nikola Tesla, will feature the exhibition “Hall of Famous European Inventors”.

In order to pay tribute to the genius mind and one of the greatest scientists from the region, whose inventions changed the world, the Nikola Tesla – Genius for the Future Association initiated the renaming of Zagreb’s Technical Museum after him. The idea was embraced by the mayor of Zagreb, Milan Bandić. The city assembly accepted his suggestion to rename the museum the Technical Museum Nikola Tesla, which will also receive a new visual identity in order to commemorate the 159th anniversary of the great scientist.

The Technical Museum was founded in 1954 in the vein of the then existing science and technical museums around the world. Five years later it was moved to its current location, the wooden buildings on Savska Street, which were originally constructed and erected in 1948 at the grounds of Zagreb Fair.

The first exhibit areas of the museum – Energy Transformation, Vehicles, and Mining, were opened to the public in 1963. The Oil exhibit was introduced a year later, followed by the department of Astronautics with a planetarium. In 1976, the museum opened the doors to the Nikola Tesla Demonstration Cabinet, which was totally reconstructed in 2006. The department of the Basics of Agriculture was opened in the early 1980s, followed by the department of Fire Fighting. The museum’s permanent exhibit has been expanded over the last several years by other exhibits, such as the sculptures of Croatian nature scientists and technical equipment, which is located in the museum’s park. The departments of the Basics of Agriculture and Mining – Geology – Oil were expanded by the Bee-hive exhibits and the Land Surveying – Cadastre Office exhibit areas, while the Department of Energy Transformation was expanded by a collection of machine models known as the Thermal Power of Fire.

After the Deutsches Museum in Munich and the Citta della Scienza Museum in Naples, the travelling exhibition, “Hall of Famous European Inventors”, can now be seen at Zagreb’s Technical Museum, offering visitors the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the inventions of finalists and winners of the prestigious, annual European Inventor Award, which has been presented since 2006 by the European Patent Office. The exhibition was organized in order to celebrate the 120th anniversary of the establishment of patent laws in Croatia, and it stands witness to the significant contribution of inventors toward the overall social, economic and technological progress.