What was the occupation of Nikola Tesla's father?

Nikola Tesla's father, Milutin Tesla, was an Orthodox priest. He served as a priest of the Eastern Orthodox Church, specifically within the Serbian Orthodox tradition, and worked as a parish priest in the family’s region of Smiljan and Gospić.

Milutin was more than a religious official in Tesla’s childhood. He was regarded as highly educated, wrote articles, and encouraged Nikola’s intellectual development. The family lived in a parish setting, exposing Tesla to books, language, religious learning, and the cultural life of a Serbian community within the Austrian Empire.

Tesla’s mother, Georgina “Đuka” Mandić, also came from a religious family: her father was an Eastern Orthodox priest. Yet she had no formal education and was known in the family for her inventive household tools and remarkable ability to memorize Serbian epic poetry.

A common mistake is to identify Milutin simply as a Christian minister or to confuse him with a Catholic priest. Tesla’s family was Serbian Orthodox, making “Orthodox priest” the precise answer.