At the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, no light blazed as bright as the rivalry between Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla. Competing against each other in the 265,200-square-foot Electricity Building, the two inventors shocked attendees with their high-energy showmanship. Tesla used his famed eponymous coil to run 250,000 volts through his body, causing him to spark and glow with the intensity of a lightning storm. Not to be outdone, Edison's exhibit offered an 82-foot-high tower topped by a 1,000-pound incandescent light bulb glistening through 5,000 prisms.