Street signs to honour scientist
Portion of Burlington Street to mark Nikola Tesla’s contribution to city
The renaming of a portion of Burlington Street in honour of the father of alternating current is taking shape.
Eight signs from the Queen Elizabeth Way to Ottawa Street will be changed to Nikola Tesla Boulevard starting June 29. Crews are expected to wrap up by July 8. They will work in the evenings. Some lane closures are expected.
Councillors backed the name change this fall after members of the Serbian community, local students and high school teachers, two former mayors, a retired majorgeneral and the consul-general for Croatia encouraged the idea.
The group behind the effort — called the Nikola Tesla Education Corporation — vowed to fundraise the more than $100,000 it would take to replace the signs.
A ceremonial cheque was handed over to the city for $150,000 to pay for the Ontario Transportation Ministry signs this spring.
Members of the non-profit group submitted a 2,000-plus signature petition calling for the change to honour the eccentric scientist’s contribution to turning Hamilton into the “Electric City” in the late 1800s.
Tesla was born in Croatia in 1856 and died in New York City in 1943.
The group says the success of his alternating current in moving electricity long distances made Hamilton’s waterfront industries among the first in Canada to power up in earnest, linked to a plant 35 kilometres away in Niagara.