Yeah. It's was interesting to see the hype wave as someone whom known of Tesla and his work prior to it and knew that he wasn't well known.

I would actually attribute a lot of the sensation to the Company Tesla... As the name obviously makes people search and curious about the company's name's meaning.

It's really weird how idealised be became. The Awkward Autro-Hungarian of Serbian decent whim fell in love with a Pigeon due to severe loneliness, likely depression and desperation. Pretty much forgotten compared to his peers like Edison when though his tech would be what especially appears as "Victorian Schi-fi". He died poor and alone, surrounded by pigeons in his New York apartment.

So i would really not call him recognised... Idealised or Unknown is what first most people's ideas of him. He was Clever, but he was nowhere near Davinci level of Clever ... Relative to each others times respectively.