Guglielmo Marconi
Guglielmo Marconi | |
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Born | 25 April 1874 Palazzo Marescalchi, Bologna, Italy |
Died | 20 July 1937 Rome, Italy |
(aged 63)
Alma mater | University of Bologna |
Known for | Radio |
Notable awards | Nobel Prize for Physics (1909) |
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Guglielmo Marconi (Italian pronunciation: [ɡuʎˈʎɛːlmo marˈkoːni]; 25 April 1874– 20 July 1937) was an Italian inventor, known as the father of long distance radio transmission[1] and for his development of Marconi's law and a radio telegraph system. Marconi is often credited as the inventor of radio, and indeed he shared the 1909 Nobel Prize in Physics with Karl Ferdinand Braun "in recognition of their contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy".[2][3][4] Much of Marconi's work in radio transmission was built upon previous experimentation[5] and the commercial exploitation of ideas by others such as Hertz, Maxwell, Faraday, Popov, Lodge, Fessenden, Stone, Bose, and Tesla. As an entrepreneur, businessman, and founder of the The Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company in 1897, Marconi was more successful than any other because of his ability to commercialize radio and its associated equipment.[6][7] In 1924, he was ennobled as Marchese Marconi.
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Biography
Early years
Marconi was born in Bologna on April 25, 1874, the second son of Giuseppe Marconi, an Italian landowner, and his Irish wife, Annie Jameson, daughter of Andrew Jameson of Daphne Castle in the County Wexford, Ireland and granddaughter of John Jameson, founder of whiskey distillers Jameson & Sons. Marconi was educated privately in Bologna in the lab of Augusto Righi, in Florence at the Istituto Cavallero and, later, in Livorno. As a child Marconi did not do well in school.[8] Baptized as a Catholic, he was also a member of the Anglican Church, being married into it; however, he still received a Catholic annulment.
Radio work
During his early years, Marconi had an interest in science and electricity. One of the scientific developments during this era came from Heinrich Hertz, who, beginning in 1888, demonstrated that one could produce and detect electromagnetic radiation—now generally known as radio waves, at the time more commonly called "Hertzian waves" or "aetheric waves". Hertz's death in 1894 brought published reviews of his earlier discoveries, and a renewed interest on the part of Marconi. He was permitted to briefly study the subject under Augusto Righi, a University of Bologna physicist and neighbour of Marconi who had done research on Hertz's work. Righi had a subscription to The Electrician where Oliver Lodge published detailed accounts of the apparatus used in his (Lodge's) public demonstrations of wireless telegraphy in 1894.
Early experimental devices
Marconi began to conduct experiments, building much of his own equipment in the attic of his home at the Villa Griffone in Pontecchio, Italy, with the help of his butler Mignani. His goal was to use radio waves to create a practical system of "wireless telegraphy"—i.e. the transmission of telegraph messages without connecting wires as used by the electric telegraph. This was not a new idea—numerous investigators had been exploring wireless telegraph technologies for over 50 years, but none had proven commercially successful. Marconi did not discover any new and revolutionary principle in his wireless-telegraph system, but rather he assembled and improved a number of components, unified and adapted them to his system.[5] Marconi's system had the following components:[9]
- A relatively simple oscillator, or spark-producing radio transmitter, which was closely modeled after one designed by Righi, in turn similar to what Hertz had used;
- A wire or capacity area placed at a height above the ground;
- A coherer receiver, which was a modification of Edouard Branly's original device, with refinements to increase sensitivity and reliability;
- A telegraph key to operate the transmitter to send short and long pulses, corresponding to the dots-and-dashes of Morse code; and
- A telegraph register, activated by the coherer, which recorded the received Morse code dots and dashes onto a roll of paper tape.
Similar configurations using spark-gap transmitters plus coherer-receivers had been tried by others, but many were unable to achieve transmission ranges of more than a few hundred metres.
Marconi, just twenty years old, began his first experiments working on his own with the help of his butler Mignani. In the summer of 1894, he built a storm alarm made up of a battery, a coherer, and an electric bell, which went off if there was lightning. Soon after he was able to make a bell ring on the other side of the room by pushing a telegraphic button on a bench.[10][citation needed] One night in December, Guglielmo woke his mother up and invited her into his secret workshop and showed her the experiment he had created. The next day he also showed his father, who, when he was certain there were no wires, gave his son all of the money he had in his wallet so Guglielmo could buy more materials. In the summer of 1895 he moved his experimentation outdoors. After increasing the length of the transmitter and receiver antennas, and arranging them vertically, and positioning the antenna so that it touched the ground, the range increased significantly.[11][12] Soon he was able to transmit signals over a hill, a distance of approximately 2.4 kilometres (1.5 mi).[13] By this point he concluded that with additional funding and research, a device could become capable of spanning greater distances and would prove valuable both commercially and militarily.
Marconi wrote to the ministry of Post and Telegraphs, which at the time was under the direction of the honorable Pietro Lacava, explaining his wireless telegraph machine and asking for funding. He never received a response to his letter which was eventually dismissed by the minister who wrote "to the Longara" on the document, referring to the insane asylum on via della Lungara in Rome.[14] In 1896, Marconi spoke with his family friend Carlo Gardini, the United States consulate in Bologna, about leaving Italy to go to England. Gardini wrote a letter to the Ambassador of Italy in London, Annibale Ferrero, explaining who Marconi was and about this extraordinary discoveries. In his response, ambassador Ferrero advised them not to reveal the results until after they had obtained the copyrights. He also encouraged him to come to England where he believed it would be easier to find the necessary funds to convert the findings from Marconi's experiment into a practical use. Finding little interest in his work in Italy, in early 1896 at the age of 21, Marconi traveled to London, accompanied by his mother, to seek support for his work; Marconi spoke fluent English in addition to Italian. While there, he gained the interest and support of William Preece, the Chief Electrical Engineer of the British Post Office. The apparatus that Marconi possessed at that time was strikingly similar to that of one in 1882 by A. E. Dolbear, of Tufts College, which used a spark coil generator and a carbon granular rectifier for reception.[15][16] A plaque[17] on the outside of BT Centre commemorates Marconi's first public transmission of wireless signals from that site.[18] A series of demonstrations for the British government followed—by March 1897, Marconi had transmitted Morse code signals over a distance of about 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) across the Salisbury Plain. On 13 May 1897, Marconi sent the first ever wireless communication over open sea. It transversed the Bristol Channel from Lavernock Point (South Wales) to Flat Holm Island, a distance of 6 kilometres (3.7 mi). The message read "Are you ready".[19] The receiving equipment was almost immediately relocated to Brean Down Fort on the Somerset coast, stretching the range to 16 kilometres (9.9 mi).
Impressed by these and other demonstrations, Preece introduced Marconi's ongoing work to the general public at two important London lectures: "Telegraphy without Wires", at the Toynbee Hall on 11 December 1896; and "Signaling through Space without Wires", given to the Royal Institution on 4 June 1897.
Numerous additional demonstrations followed, and Marconi began to receive international attention. In July 1897, he carried out a series of tests at La Spezia in his home country, for the Italian government. A test for Lloyds between Ballycastle and Rathlin Island, Ireland, was conducted on 6 July 1898. The English channel was crossed on 27 March 1899, from Wimereux, France to South Foreland Lighthouse, England, and in the autumn of 1899, the first demonstrations in the United States took place, with the reporting of the America's Cup international yacht races at New York.
Marconi sailed to the United States at the invitation of the New York Herald newspaper to cover the America's Cup races off Sandy Hook, NJ. The transmission was done aboard the SS Ponce, a passenger ship of the Porto Rico Line.[20] Marconi left for England on 8 November 1899 on the American Line's SS St. Paul, and he and his assistants installed wireless equipment aboard during the voyage. On 15 November the St. Paul became the first ocean liner to report her imminent arrival by wireless when Marconi's Needles station contacted her sixty-six nautical miles off the English coast.
According to the Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute, the Marconi instruments were tested around 1899 and the tests concerning his wireless system found that the "[...] coherer, principle of which was discovered some twenty years ago, [was] the only electrical instrument or device contained in the apparatus that is at all new".[21]
Transatlantic transmissions
![](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20120111170027im_/http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Marconi_at_newfoundland.jpg)
“ | See if you can hear anything, Mr. Kemp![22] | ” |
Around the turn of the century, Marconi began investigating the means to signal completely across the Atlantic, in order to compete with the transatlantic telegraph cables. Marconi established a wireless transmitting station at Marconi House, Rosslare Strand, Co. Wexford in 1901 to act as a link between Poldhu in Cornwall and Clifden in Co. Galway. He soon made the announcement that on 12 December 1901, using a 152.4-metre (500 ft) kite-supported antenna for reception, the message was received at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland (now part of Canada) signals transmitted by the company's new high-power station at Poldhu, Cornwall. The distance between the two points was about 3,500 kilometres (2,200 mi). Heralded as a great scientific advance, there was—and continues to be—some skepticism about this claim, partly because the signals had been heard faintly and sporadically. There was no independent confirmation of the reported reception, and the transmissions, consisting of the Morse code letter S sent repeatedly, were difficult to distinguish from atmospheric noise. (A detailed technical review of Marconi's early transatlantic work appears in John S. Belrose's work of 1995.)[23] The Poldhu transmitter was a two-stage circuit.[24][25] The first stage operated at lower voltage and provided the energy for the second stage to spark at a higher voltage. Nikola Tesla, a rival in transatlantic transmission, stated after being told of Marconi's reported transmission that "Marconi [... was] using seventeen of my patents."[26][27]
Feeling challenged by skeptics, Marconi prepared a better organized and documented test. In February 1902, the SS Philadelphia sailed west from Great Britain with Marconi aboard, carefully recording signals sent daily from the Poldhu station. The test results produced coherer-tape reception up to 2,496 kilometres (1,551 mi), and audio reception up to 3,378 kilometres (2,099 mi). The maximum distances were achieved at night, and these tests were the first to show that for mediumwave and longwave transmissions, radio signals travel much farther at night than in the day. During the daytime, signals had only been received up to about 1,125 kilometres (699 mi), less than half of the distance claimed earlier at Newfoundland, where the transmissions had also taken place during the day. Because of this, Marconi had not fully confirmed the Newfoundland claims, although he did prove that radio signals could be sent for hundreds of kilometres, despite some scientists' belief they were essentially limited to line-of-sight distances.
On 17 December 1902, a transmission from the Marconi station in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada, became the first radio message to cross the Atlantic from North America. In 1901, Marconi built a station near South Wellfleet, Massachusetts that on January 18, 1903 sent a message of greetings from Theodore Roosevelt, the President of the United States, to King Edward VII of the United Kingdom, marking the first transatlantic radio transmission originating in the United States. This station also was one of the first to receive the distress signals coming from the RMS Titanic. However, consistent transatlantic signalling was difficult to establish.
Marconi began to build high-powered stations on both sides of the Atlantic to communicate with ships at sea, in competition with other inventors. In 1904 a commercial service was established to transmit nightly news summaries to subscribing ships, which could incorporate them into their on-board newspapers. A regular transatlantic radio-telegraph service was finally begun on 17 October 1907[28] between Clifden Ireland and Glace Bay, but even after this the company struggled for many years to provide reliable communication.
Titanic
The two radio operators aboard the Titanic—Jack Phillips and Harold Bride—were not employed by the White Star Line, but by the Marconi International Marine Communication Company. Following the sinking of the ocean liner, survivors were rescued by the RMS Carpathia of the Cunard Line.[29] Also employed by the Marconi Company was David Sarnoff, the only person to receive the names of survivors immediately after the disaster via wireless technology. Wireless communications were reportedly maintained for 72 hours between the Carpathia and Sarnoff,[30] but Sarnoff's involvement has been questioned by some modern historians. When the Carpathia docked in New York, Marconi went aboard with a reporter from The New York Times to talk with Bride, the surviving operator.[29] On 18 June 1912, Marconi gave evidence to the Court of Inquiry into the loss of the Titanic regarding the marine telegraphy's functions and the procedures for emergencies at sea.[31] Britain's postmaster-general summed up, referring to the Titanic disaster, "Those who have been saved, have been saved through one man, Mr. Marconi...and his marvelous invention."
Patent disputes
Marconi's work built upon the discoveries of numerous other scientists and experimenters. His "two-circuit" equipment, consisting of a spark-gap transmitter plus a coherer-receiver, was similar to those used by other experimenters, and in particular to that employed by Oliver Lodge in a series of widely reported demonstrations in 1894. There were claims that Marconi was able to signal for greater distances than anyone else when using the spark-gap and coherer combination, but these have been disputed (notably by Tesla).[32]
The 1895 public demonstrations by J.C. Bose in Calcutta regarding radio transmission were conducted before Marconi's wireless signaling experiments on Salisbury Plain in England in May 1897.[33][34] In 1896, the Daily Chronicle of England reported on his UHF experiments: "The inventor (J.C. Bose) has transmitted signals to a distance of nearly a mile and herein lies the first and obvious and exceedingly valuable application of this new theoretical marvel." Marconi, while being fully aware of Bose's prior work in this area, nonetheless claimed exclusive patent rights.[35]
In 1900 Alexander Stepanovich Popov stated to the Congress of Russian Electrical Engineers that: "[...] the emission and reception of signals by Marconi by means of electric oscillations [was] nothing new. In America, the famous engineer Nikola Tesla carried the same experiments in 1893."[36]
When Marconi transmitted signals across the Atlantic on December 12, 1901, Tesla himself commented: "Marconi is a good fellow. Let him continue. He is using 17 of my patents."[37]
The Fascist regime in Italy credited Marconi with the first improvised arrangement in the development of radio.[38] There was controversy whether his contribution was sufficient to deserve patent protection, or if his devices were too close to the original ones developed by Hertz, Popov, Branley, Tesla, and Lodge to be patentable.
While Marconi did pioneering demonstrations for the time, his equipment was limited by being essentially untuned, which greatly restricted the number of spark-gap radio transmitters which could operate simultaneously in a geographical area without causing mutually disruptive interference. (Continuous-wave transmitters were naturally more selective and less prone to this deficiency). Marconi addressed this defect with a patent application for a much more sophisticated "four-circuit" design, which featured two tuned-circuits at both the transmitting and receiving antennas. This was issued as British patent number 7,777 on 26 April 1900. However, this patent came after significant earlier work had been done on electrical tuning by Nikola Tesla and Oliver Lodge. (As a defensive move, in 1911 the Marconi Company purchased the Lodge-Muirhead Syndicate, whose primary asset was Oliver Lodge's 1897 tuning patent. This followed a 1911 court case in which the Marconi company was ruled to have infringed Lodge's tuning patent.) Thus, the "four-sevens" patent and its equivalents in other countries was the subject of numerous legal challenges, with rulings which varied by jurisdiction, from full validation of Marconi's tuning patent to complete nullification.
In 1943, a lawsuit regarding Marconi's numerous other radio patents was resolved in the United States. The court decision was based on the prior work conducted by others, including Nikola Tesla, Oliver Lodge, and John Stone Stone, from which some of Marconi patents (such as U.S. Patent 763,772) stemmed. The U. S. Supreme Court stated that,
The Tesla patent No. 645,576, applied for 2 September 1897 and allowed 20 March 1900, disclosed a four-circuit system, having two circuits each at transmitter and receiver, and recommended that all four circuits be tuned to the same frequency. [... He] recognized that his apparatus could, without change, be used for wireless communication, which is dependent upon the transmission of electrical energy.[39]
In making their decision, the court noted,
Marconi's reputation as the man who first achieved successful radio transmission rests on his original patent, which became reissue No. 11,913, and which is not here [320 U.S. 1, 38] in question. That reputation, however well-deserved, does not entitle him to a patent for every later improvement which he claims in the radio field. Patent cases, like others, must be decided not by weighing the reputations of the litigants, but by careful study of the merits of their respective contentions and proofs."[40]
The court also stated that,
It is well established that as between two inventors priority of invention will be awarded to the one who by satisfying proof can show that he first conceived of the invention."[40]
The Supreme Court of the United States did not dispute Marconi's original British patent nor his reputation as the inventor of radio. The US Supreme Court stated that his original patent (which became reissue 11,913) was not being disputed.[41]
The case was resolved in the U.S. Supreme Court by overturning most of Marconi's patents. At the time, the United States Army was involved in a patent infringement lawsuit with Marconi's company regarding radio, leading observers to posit that the government nullified Marconi's other patents to render moot claims for compensation (as, it is speculated, the government's initial reversal to grant Marconi the patent right in order to nullify any claims Tesla had for compensation). In contrast to the United States system, Mr. Justice Parker of the British High Court of Justice upheld Marconi's "four-sevens" tuning patent. These proceedings made up only a part of a long series of legal struggles, as major corporations jostled for advantage in a new and important industry.
Continuing work
“ | Have I done the world good, or have I added a menace?[42] | ” |
Over the years, the Marconi companies gained a reputation for being technically conservative, in particular by continuing to use inefficient spark-transmitter technology, which could only be used for radiotelegraph operations, long after it was apparent that the future of radio communication lay with continuous-wave transmissions, which were more efficient and could be used for audio transmissions. Somewhat belatedly, the company did begin significant work with continuous-wave equipment beginning in 1915, after the introduction of the oscillating vacuum tube (valve). In 1920, employing a vacuum tube transmitter, the Chelmsford Marconi factory was the location for the first entertainment radio broadcasts in the United Kingdom—one of these featured Dame Nellie Melba. In 1922 regular entertainment broadcasts commenced from the Marconi Research Centre at Writtle.
Later years
In 1914 Marconi was made a Senator in the Italian Senate and appointed Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order in the UK. During World War I, Italy joined the Allied side of the conflict, and Marconi was placed in charge of the Italian military's radio service. He attained the rank of lieutenant in the Italian Army and of commander in the Italian Navy. In 1924, he was made a marquess by King Victor Emmanuel III.
Marconi joined the Italian Fascist party in 1923. In 1930, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini appointed him President of the Royal Academy of Italy, which made Marconi a member of the Fascist Grand Council.
Marconi died in Rome in 1937 at age 63 following a series of heart attacks, and Italy held a state funeral for him. As a tribute, all radio stations throughout the world observed two minutes of silence. His remains are housed in the Villa Griffone at Sasso Marconi, Emilia-Romagna, which assumed that name in his honour in 1938.
Personal life
![](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20120111170027im_/http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f8/Alfred_Norton_Goldsmith_%26_Guglielmo_Marconi_1922.jpg/220px-Alfred_Norton_Goldsmith_%26_Guglielmo_Marconi_1922.jpg)
Marconi had a brother, Alfonso, and a stepbrother, Luigi. On 16 March 1905, Marconi married the Hon. Beatrice O'Brien (1882–1976), a daughter of Edward Donough O'Brien, 14th Baron Inchiquin. They had three daughters, Degna (1908–1998), Gioia (1916–1996), and Lucia (born and died 1906), and a son, Giulio, 2nd Marchese Marconi (1910–1971). The Marconis divorced in 1924, and, at Marconi's request, the marriage was annulled on 27 April 1927, so he could remarry.[43] Beatrice Marconi married her second husband, Liborio Marignoli, Marchese di Montecorona, on 3 March 1924 and had a daughter, Flaminia.[44]
On 12 June 1927 (religious 15 June), Marconi married Maria Cristina Bezzi-Scali (1900—1994), only daughter of Francesco, Count Bezzi-Scali. Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini was Marconi's best man at the wedding.[45][46] They had one daughter, Maria Elettra Elena Anna (born 1930), who married Prince Carlo Giovannelli (born 1942) in 1966; they later divorced.
For unexplained reasons, Marconi left his entire fortune to his second wife and their only child, and nothing to the children of his first marriage.[47]
Later in life, Marconi was an active Italian Fascist[48] and an apologist for their ideology and actions such as the attack by Italian forces in Ethiopia.
Marconi wanted to personally introduce in 1931 the first radio broadcast of a Pope, Pius XI, announcing at the microphone: "With the help of God, who places so many mysterious forces of nature at man's disposal, I have been able to prepare this instrument which will give to the faithful of the entire world the joy of listening to the voice of the Holy Father".[49]
Legacy and honours
Honours and awards
- In 1909, Marconi shared the Nobel Prize in Physics with Karl Braun for his contributions to radio communications.[2]
- In 1918, he was awarded the Franklin Institute's Franklin Medal.
- In 1924, he was made a marquess by King Victor Emmanuel III., thus becoming Marchese Marconi.
- The Radio Hall of Fame (Museum of Broadcast Communications, Chicago) inducted Marconi soon after the inception of its awards. He was inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame in 2009.[50]
- The Dutch radio academy bestows the Marconi Awards annually for outstanding radio programmes, presenters and stations; the National Association of Broadcasters (US) bestows the annual NAB Marconi Radio Awards also for outstanding radio programs and stations.
- Marconi was inducted into the National Broadcasters Hall of Fame in 1977.[51]
- A commemorative British two pound coin was released in 2001 celebrating the 100th anniversary of Marconi's first wireless communication.
- A commemorative silver 5 EURO coin was issued by Italy in 2009 honouring the centennial of Marconi's Nobel Prize.
- A funerary monument to the effigy of Marconi can be seen in the Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence but his remains are in Sasso, near Bologna.
- Marconi's early experiments in wireless telegraphy were the subject of two IEEE Milestones; one in Switzerland in 2003[52] and most recently in Italy in 2011.[53]
Tributes
- The premier collection of Marconi artifacts was held by The General Electric Company, p.l.c. (GEC) of the United Kingdom which later renamed to Marconi plc and Marconi Corporation plc. In December 2004 the extensive Marconi Collection, held at the former Marconi Research Centre at Great Baddow, Chelmsford, Essex UK was gifted to the Nation by the Company via the University of Oxford. This consisted of the BAFTA award-winning MarconiCalling website, some 250+ physical artifacts and the massive ephemera collection of papers, books, patents and many other items. The artifacts are now held by The Museum of the History of Science and the ephemera Archives by the nearby Bodleian Library. The latest release, following three years work at the Bodleian, is the Online Catalogue to the Marconi Archives, released in November 2008.
- Ira Gershwin's lyrics to "They All Laughed" include the line, "They told Marconi wireless was a phony."
- The band Tesla references him in "Edison's Medicine" lyrics: They'll sell you on Marconi, familiar, but a phony."
- The band Jefferson Starship references him in their song We Built This City. The lyrics say: "Marconi plays the mamba, listen to the radio".
- The 1955 play Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee includes a reference to Marconi in scene 1.
- The 1979 play 'The Man From Mukinupin' by Dorothy Hewett makes several references to Marconi by the character The Flasher, who imagines he is communicating with Marconi through a box of matches. "Marconi the great one, speak to me!", "Marconi, Marconi, must I kill?" and "Marconi says I must not frighten the ladies..."
- The Bermuda rig, developed in the 17th century by Bermudians, became ubiquitous on sailboats around the world in the 20th century. The tall masts and triangular fore-and-aft sails reminded some people of Marconi's wireless towers, hence the rig became known also as the Marconi rig.
- A sculpture devoted to Marconi resides in Washington, D.C.
Places and organizations named after Marconi
- Ireland
- Marconi Park, Ballycastle
- Italy
- Guglielmo Marconi Airport (IATA: BLQ – ICAO: LIPE), of Bologna, Italy, is named after Marconi, its native son.
- "Guglielmo Marconi" University in Rome, Italy.(Università degli Studi "Guglielmo Marconi" di Roma).
- Via Guglielmo Marconi in the city of Bologna, Italy
- Viale Guglielmo Marconi in the city of Rome, Italy
- Australia
- Australian soccer club Marconi Stallions
- Canada
- The former town of Glace Bay, now part of the Cape Breton Regional Municipality, Nova Scotia, has a Marconi Street and, on the outskirts, a Marconi Tower Road.
- The 'Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company of Canada', of Montreal, Canada, was created in 1903 by Guglielmo Marconi.[54] In 1925 the company was renamed to the 'Canadian Marconi Company', which was acquired by English Electric in 1953.[54] The company name changed again to CMC Electronics Inc. (French: CMC Électronique) in 2001.
- The Marconi Wireless Corporation operated several pioneer and commercial radio stations in Canada, Ireland, Newfoundland, the United States and the United Kingdom.
- The Marconi National Historic Site of Canada was created by Parks Canada as a tribute to Marconi's vision in the development of radio telecommunications. The first official wireless message was sent from this location by the Atlantic Ocean to England in 1902. The museum site is located in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, at Table Head on Timmerman Street.
- Villa Marconi retirement home, Nepean, Ontario
- Marconi Street in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. Italian Canadians make up a large percentage of the city's residents.
- 284 Royal Canadian Sea Cadet Corps Marconi, Mount Pearl, Newfoundland and Labrador
- People's Republic of China
- Marconi Road in Kowloon Tong, former home of many of Hong Kong's broadcasters, including Asia Television Limited and Television Broadcasts Limited
- Israel
- Marconi Street in the city of Haifa.
- United Kingdom
- Marconi Centre, Chelmsford
- United States
- Marconi Plaza, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Roman terrace-styled plaza originally designed by the architects Olmsted Brothers in 1914–1916, built as the grand entrance for the 1926 Sesquicentennial Exposition and renamed to honor Marconi.
- Marconiville section of the town of Copiague
- Upper East Side New York's La Scuola D'Italia
- Marconi Conference Center and State Historic Park, Marshall, California. Site of the transoceanic Marshall Receiving Station.
- Marconi Avenue, The Hill, St. Louis
- Marconi memorial statue on Telegraph Hill, San Francisco
- Marconi Beach in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, part of the Cape Cod National Seashore, located near the site of his first transatlantic wireless signal from the U.S to England.
- Marconi monument at Fulton intersection, Sacramento, CA
- Marconi Boulevard in Rocky Point, New York. His original radio shack is found along that road at the Frank J. Carasiti Elementary School in Rocky Point.
- Guglielmo Marconi Memorial Plaza in Somerset, NJ, located on the former site of the New Brunswick Marconi Station. President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points speech was transmitted from the site in 1918.
- Marconi Road in Wall Township, New Jersey, located in the former Camp Evans, which was the site of the Belmar Marconi Station. Now the location of the Infoage Science/History Learning Center, dedicated to the preservation and education of information age technologies.
- Piazza Guglielmo Marconi, northeast sector of the intersection of Atwood Avenue and Plainfield Street, Johnston, Rhode Island[55]
- Marconi Avenue in Sacramento, California.
- Marconi Boulevard in Columbus, Ohio.
- Marconi Avenue in Ronkonkoma, New York.
- Mexico
- Guillermo Marconi Street, in Mexico City.
Patents
British patents
- British patent No. 12,039, Date of Application 2 June 1896; Complete Specification Left, 2 March 1897; Accepted, 2 July 1897 (later claimed by Oliver Lodge to contain his own ideas which he failed to patent)
US patents
- U.S. Patent 0,586,193 "Transmitting electrical signals", (using Ruhmkorff coil and Morse code key) filed December 1896, patented July, 1897
- U.S. Patent 0,624,516 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,627,650 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,647,007 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,647,008 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,647,009 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,650,109 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,650,110 "Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,668,315 "Receiver for electrical oscillations".
- U.S. Patent 0,760,463 "Wireless signaling system".
- U.S. Patent 0,792,528 "Wireless telegraphy". Filed 13 October 1903; Issued 13, 1905.
- U.S. Patent 0,676,332 "Apparatus for wireless telegraphy" (later practical version of system)
- U.S. Patent 0,757,559 "Wireless telegraphy system". Filed 19 November 1901; Issued 19 April 1904.
- U.S. Patent 0,760,463 "Wireless signaling system". Filed 10 September 1903; Issued 24 May 1904.
- U.S. Patent 0,763,772 "Apparatus for wireless telegraphy" (Four tuned system; this innovation was predated by N. Tesla, O. Lodge, and J. S. Stone)
- U.S. Patent 0,786,132 "Wireless telegraphy". Filed 13 October 1903
- U.S. Patent 0,792,528 "Wireless telegraphy". Filed 13 October 1903; Issued 13 June 1905.
- U.S. Patent 0,884,986 "Wireless telegraphy". Filed 28 November 1902; Issued 14 April 1908.
- U.S. Patent 0,884,987 "Wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,884,988 "Detecting electrical oscillations". Filed 2 February 1903; Issued 14 April 1908.
- U.S. Patent 0,884,989 "Wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,935,381 "Transmitting apparatus for wireless telegraphy". Filed 10 April 1908; Issued 28 September 1909.
- U.S. Patent 0,935,382 "Apparatus for wireless telegraphy".
- U.S. Patent 0,935,383 "Apparatus for wireless telegraphy". Filed 10 April 1908; Issued 28 September 1909.
- U.S. Patent 0,954,640 "Apparatus for wireless telegraphy". Filed 31 March 1909; Issued 12 April 1910.
- U.S. Patent 0,997,308 "Transmitting apparatus for wireless telegraphy". Filed 15 July 1910; Issued 11 July 1911.
- U.S. Patent 1,102,990 "Means for generating alternating electric currents". Filed 27 January 1914; Issued 7 July 1914.
- U.S. Patent 1,148,521 "Transmitter for wireless telegraphy". Filed 20 July 1908.
- U.S. Patent 1,226,099 "Transmitting apparatus for use in wireless telegraphy and telephony". Filed 31 December 1913; Issued 15 May 1917.
- U.S. Patent 1,271,190 "Wireless telegraph transmitter".
- U.S. Patent 1,377,722 "Electric accumulator". Filed 9 March 1918
- U.S. Patent 1,148,521 "Transmitter for wireless telegraphy". Filed 20 July 1908; Issued 3 August 1915.
- U.S. Patent 1,981,058 "Thermionic valve". Filed 14 October 1926; Issued 20 November 1934.
Reissued (US)
- U.S. Patent RE11,913 "Transmitting electrical impulses and signals and in apparatus, there-for". Filed 1 April 1901; Issued 4 Jun 1901.
See also
- Invention of radio
- Jagdish Chandra Bose
- List of people on stamps of Ireland
- Sasso Marconi
- List of people on the cover of Time Magazine: 1920s – 6 Dec. 1926
Notes
- ^ "Guglielmo Marconi – The father of long distance radio communication – An engineer's tribute". http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplore/login.jsp?url=http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/iel5/4137114/4137241/04137304.pdf%3Farnumber%3D4137304&authDecision=-203.
- ^ a b "Guglielmo Marconi: The Nobel Prize in Physics 1909"
- ^ "Welcome to IEEE Xplore 2.0: Sir J.C. Bose diode detector received Marconi's first transatlanticwireless signal of December 1901 (the "Italian Navy Coherer"Scandal Revisited)". Ieeexplore.ieee.org. http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?arnumber=658778. Retrieved 2009-01-29.
- ^ Roy, Amit (2008-12-08). "Cambridge 'pioneer' honour for Bose". The Telegraph (Calcutta: Telegraphindia.com). http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081208/jsp/nation/story_10221833.jsp. Retrieved 2010-06-10.
- ^ a b Williams, H. S., & Williams, E. H. (1910). Every-day science. New York: Goodhue Company. Page 54.
- ^ Icons of invention: the makers of the modern world from Gutenberg to Gates. ABC-CLIO. http://books.google.com/books?id=WKuG-VIwID8C&pg=PA161&dq=British+High+Court+upheld+patent+7777&hl=en&ei=8hc_TujkFubb0QGUvantAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 07-08-2011.
- ^ Ingenious Ireland: A County-by-County Exploration of the Mysteries and Marvels of the Ingenious Irish. Simon and Schuster. http://books.google.com/books?id=exics12jmtwC&pg=PA313&dq=Marconi+successful+at+commercializing+radio&hl=en&ei=wTpATvudJ9OftgeNzMnFBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CDIQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false. Retrieved 07-08-2011.
- ^ Robert McHenry, "Guglielmo Marconi," in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1993.
- ^ Marconi delineated his 1895 apparatus in his Nobel Award speech. See: Marconi, "Wireless Telegraphic Communication: Nobel Lecture, 11 December 1909." Nobel Lectures. Physics 1901–1921. Amsterdam: Elsevier Publishing Company, 1967: 196–222. Page 198.
- ^ Guglielmo Marconi, padre della radio
- ^ This fact was known to many as, in 1893, Tesla stated in the widely known "On Light and Other High Frequency Phenomena" speech which was delivered before the Franklin Institute, Philadelphia, in February, and before the National Electric Light Association, St. Louis, in March, that "One of the terminals of the source would be connected to Earth [as a electric ground connection ...] the other to an insulated body of large surface".
- ^ Marconi did acknowledge this later in his Nobel Award speech. See: Marconi, "Wireless Telegraphic Communication: Nobel Lecture, 11 December 1909." Nobel Lectures. Physics 1901–1921. Amsterdam: Elsevier Publishing Company, 1967: 196–222. Page 206.
- ^ "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1909". http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1909/marconi-bio.html.
- ^ Luigi Solari, Guglielmo Marconi e la Marina Militare Italiana, Rivista Marittima, febbraio 1948
- ^ Alfred Thomas Story, The Story of Wireless Telegraphy. 1904. Page 58.
- ^ John J. O'Neill, Prodigal Genius:The Life of Nikola Tesla. Ives Washburn, New York, 1944
- ^ Plaque #2389 on Open Plaques.
- ^ "Flickr Photo". http://www.flickr.com/photos/psd/164193649/.
- ^ BBC Wales, "Marconi's Waves"
- ^ Helgesen, Henry N.. "Wireless Goes to Sea: Marconi's Radio and SS Ponce". Sea History (Spring 2008): 122.
- ^ United States Naval Institute, Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute. The Institute, 1899. Page 857.
- ^ Page, Walter Hines, and Arthur Wilson Page, The World's Work. Doubleday, Page & Company, 1908. Page 9625
- ^ "Fessenden and Marconi: Their Differing Technologies and Transatlantic Experiments During the First Decade of this Century". Ieee.ca. http://www.ieee.ca/millennium/radio/radio_differences.html. Retrieved 2009-01-29.
- ^ "Marconi and the History of Radio".
- ^ John S. Belrose, "Fessenden and Marconi: Their Differing Technologies and Transatlantic Experiments During the First Decade of this Century". International Conference on 100 Years of Radio – 5–7 September 1995.
- ^ Margaret Cheney, Tesla, Man Out of Time, New Jersey : Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1981
- ^ Margaret Cheney and Robert Uth, Tesla: Master of Lightning, Barnes & Noble, 1999.
- ^ "The Clifden Station of the Marconi Wireless Telegraph System". Scientific American. 23 November 1907.
- ^ a b John P. Eaton & Charles A. Haas Titanic – Triumph and Tragedy, A Chronicle in Words and Pictures. 1994
- ^ Herron, Edward A. (1969). Miracle of the Air Waves: A History of Radio. Messner. ISBN 0671320793.
- ^ Court of Inquiry Loss of the S.S. Titanic 1912
- ^ Marconi's late-1895 transmission of signals was for around a mile (1.6 km). This was small compared to Tesla's early-1895 transmissions of up to 50 miles. For more see "Nikola Tesla On His Work with Alternating Currents and Their Application to Wireless Telegraphy, Telephony, and Transmission of Power", Leland I. Anderson, Twenty First Century Books, 2002, pp. 26–27.
- ^ "The Work of Jagdish Chandra Bose: 100 years of mm-wave research". tuc.nrao.edu.
- ^ "Jagadish Chandra Bose", ieeeghn.org.
- ^ Bondyopadhyay, P.K. (January 1998). "Sir J. C. Bose's Diode Detector Received Marconi's First Transatlantic Wireless Signal Of December 1901 (The "Italian Navy Coherer" Scandal Revisited)". Proceedings of the IEEE 86 (1): 259–285. doi:10.1109/5.658778. http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/Xplore/login.jsp?url=/iel3/5/14340/00658778.pdf?arnumber=658778. Retrieved 2007-03-13.
- ^ "The Guglielmo Marconi Case; Who is the True Inventor of Radio".
- ^ "Universitat Pompeu Fabra". The Hall of Innovation. http://www.dtic.upf.edu/~alozano/innovation/.
- ^ Gianni Isola, "Italian radio: History and Historiography"; Special Issue: Italian Media Since World War II. Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, August, 1995
- ^ U.S. Supreme Court, "Marconi Wireless Telegraph co. of America v. United States". 320 U.S. 1. Nos. 369, 373. Argued 9–12 April 1943. Decided 21 June 1943.
- ^ a b Wireless Telegraph co. of America v. United States.
- ^ U.S. Supreme Court, "Marconi Wireless Telegraph co. of America v. United States". 320 U.S. 1. Nos. 369, 373. Argued 9–12 April 1943. Decided 21 June 1943.
- ^ William John Baker, "History Of The Marconi Company 1874–1965". 1996. 416 pages. Page 296
- ^ Degna Marconi, My Father, Marconi (Guernica Editions, 2001), pages 218–227
- ^ Kelly's Handbook to the Titled, Landed, and Official Classes (Kelly's, 1969), page 623
- ^ George P. Oslin, The Story of Telecommunications. 1992. 507 pages. Page 294.
- ^ Gerald Sussman, Communication, Technology, and Politics in the Information Age. 1997. Page 90.
- ^ Degna Marconi, My Father, Marconi (Guernica Editions, 2001), pages 232
- ^ Physicsworld.com, "Guglielmo Marconi: radio star", 2001
- ^ "80 Years of Vatican Radio, Pope Pius XI and Marconi . . . and Father Jozef Murgas?". Saint Benedict Center. http://catholicism.org/80-years-of-vatican-radio-pope-pius-xi-and-marconi-and-father-jozef-murgas.html.
- ^ New Jersey to Bon Jovi: You Give Us a Good Name Yahoo News, 2 February 2009
- ^ National Broadcasters Hall of Fame. Accessed 2009-02-10
- ^ "Milestones:Marconi's Early Wireless Experiments, 1895". IEEE Global History Network. IEEE. http://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/Milestones:Marconi%27s_Early_Wireless_Experiments,_1895. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ "List of IEEE Milestones". IEEE Global History Network. IEEE. http://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/Milestones:List_of_IEEE_Milestones. Retrieved 29 July 2011.
- ^ a b "CMC Electronics' Profile". CMC Electronics Inc.. http://www.cmcelectronics.ca/En/About/cmc_profile_en.html. Retrieved 2007-01-12.
- ^ 01-S 879 R.I. State Senate act, April 25, 2001 Retrieved Aug. 23, 2010
Further reading
- Relatives and company publications
- Bussey, Gordon, Marconi's Atlantic Leap, Marconi Communications, 2000. ISBN 0-95389-670-6
- Marconi, Degna, My Father, Marconi, James Lorimer & Co, 1982. ISBN 0-919511-14-7 – (Italian version): Marconi, mio padre, Di Renzo Editore, 2008, ISBN 8883232062
- Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company, Year book of wireless telegraphy and telephony, London: Published for the Marconi Press Agency Ltd., by the St. Catherine Press / Wireless Press. LCCN 14017875 sn 86035439
- Other
- Ahern, Steve (ed), Making Radio (2nd Edition) Allen & Unwin, Sydney, 2006.
- Aitken, Hugh G. J., Syntony and Spark: The Origins of Radio, New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1976. ISBN 0-471-01816-3
- Aitken, Hugh G. J., The Continuous Wave: Technology and American Radio, 1900–1932, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1985. ISBN 0-691-08376-2.
- Anderson, Leland I., Priority in the Invention of Radio — Tesla vs. Marconi
- Baker, W. J., A History of the Marconi Company, 1970.
- Brodsky, Ira. "The History of Wireless: How Creative Minds Produced Technology for the Masses" (Telescope Books, 2008)
- Cheney, Margaret, "Tesla: Man Out Of Time" Laurel Publishing, 1981. Chapter 7, esp pp 69, re: published lectures of Tesla in 1893, copied by Marconi.
- Clark, Paddy, "Marconi's Irish Connections Recalled," published in ";100 Years of Radio," IEE Conference Publication 411, 1995.
- Coe, Douglas and Kreigh Collins (ills), Marconi, pioneer of radio, New York, J. Messner, Inc., 1943. LCCN 43010048
- Garratt, G. R. M., The early history of radio: from Faraday to Marconi, London, Institution of Electrical Engineers in association with the Science Museum, History of technology series, 1994. ISBN 0-85296-845-0 LCCN gb 94011611
- Geddes, Keith, Guglielmo Marconi, 1874–1937, London : H.M.S.O., A Science Museum booklet, 1974. ISBN 0-11-290198-0 LCCN 75329825 (ed. Obtainable in the U.S.A. from Pendragon House Inc., Palo Alto, California.)
- Hancock, Harry Edgar, Wireless at sea; the first fifty years: A history of the progress and development of marine wireless communications written to commemorate the jubilee of the Marconi International Marine Communication Company, Limited, Chelmsford, Eng., Marconi International Marine Communication Co., 1950. LCCN 51040529 /L
- Hong, Sungook, Wireless: From Marconi’s Black-Box to the Audio, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2001. ISBN 0-262-08298-5.
- Janniello, Maria Grace, Monteleone, Franco and Paoloni, Giovanni (eds) (1996), One hundred years of radio: From Marconi to the future of the telecommunications. Catalogue of the extension, Venice: Marsilio.
- Jolly, W. P., Marconi, 1972.
- Kinzie, P. A., Early Wireless: Marconi was not Alone.
- Larson, Erik, Thunderstruck, New York: Crown Publishers, 2006. ISBN 1-4000-8066-5 A comparison of the lives of Hawley Harvey Crippen and Marconi. Crippen was a murderer whose Transatlantic escape was foiled by the new invention of shipboard radio.
- Masini, Giancarlo, Guglielmo Marconi, Turin: Turinese typographical-publishing union, 1975. LCCN 77472455 (ed. Contains 32 tables outside of the text)
- Mason, H. B. (1908). Encyclopaedia of ships and shipping, Wireless Telegraphy. London: Shipping Encyclopaedia. 1908. 707 pages.
- Page, Walter Hines, and Arthur Wilson Page, The World's Work. Doubleday, Page & Company, 1908. Page 9625
- Perry, Lawrence (March 1902). "Commercial Wireless Telegraphy". The World's Work: A History of Our Time V: 3194–3201. http://books.google.com/books?id=DoDNAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA3194. Retrieved 2009-07-10.
- Stone, Ellery W., Elements of Radiotelegraphy
- Weightman, Gavin, Signor Marconi's magic box: the most remarkable invention of the 19th century & the amateur inventor whose genius sparked a revolution, 1st Da Capo Press ed., Cambridge, MA : Da Capo Press, 2003. ISBN 0-306-81275-4
- Winkler, Jonathan Reed. Nexus: Strategic Communications and American Security in World War I. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008). Account of rivalry between Marconi's firm and the U.S. government during World War I.
External links
- Wikimedia
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Guglielmo Marconi |
"Marconi, Guglielmo". Encyclopædia Britannica (12th ed.). 1922.
- General achievements
- Nobel Prize: Guglielmo Marconi biography
- Marconi il 5 marzo 1896, presenta a Londra la prima richiesta provvisoria di brevetto, col numero 5028 e col titolo "Miglioramenti nella telegrafia e relativi apparati" (Great Britain and France between 1896 and 1924)
- List of British and French patents (1896–1924) The first patent application number 5028 of 5 March 1896 (Provisional deprivation)
- Foundations and academics
- University of Oxford Online Catalogue of the Marconi Collection
- University of Oxford Online Catalogue of the Marconi Archives
- Guglielmo Marconi Foundation, Pontecchio Marconi, Bologna, Italy
- Galileo Legacy Foundation: pictures of the Dedication of the Guglielmo Marconi Square, Johnston RI USA Dedication Photos
- History of Marconi House, Marconi House, Strand / Aldwych, London.
- Multimedia and books
- Canadian Heritage Minute featuring Marconi
- Guglielmo Marconi documentary, narrated by Walter Cronkite
- Review of Signor Marconi's Magic Box
- Transatlantic "signals" and radio
- Robert (Bob) White, Guglielmo Marconi – Aerial Assistance With a Kite. Bridging the Atlantic By Wireless Signal – Dec. 12, 1901. Kiting, The Journal of the American Kitefliers Association. Vol. 23, Issue 5 – Winter 2002. November 2001
- BBC Reference to his first transmission over water
- Faking the Waves, 1901
- Marconi and His South Wellfleet Wireless (Cape Cod National Seashore
- Marconi and "wireless telegraphy" using kites
- Keys and "signals"
- Sparks Telegraph Key Review An exhaustive listing of wireless telegraph key manufacturers including photos of most Marconi keys
- United States Senate Inquiry into the Titanic disaster – Testimony of Guglielmo Marconi
- Priority of invention
vs Tesla
- PBS: Marconi and Tesla: Who invented radio?
- U.S. Supreme Court, "Marconi Wireless Telegraph co. of America v. United States". 320 U.S. 1. Nos. 369, 373. Argued 9–12 April 1943. Decided 21 June 1943.
- 21st Century Books: Priority in the Invention of Radio — Tesla vs. Marconi
- Personal
- Information about Marconi and his yacht Elettra
- I diari di laboratorio di Guglielmo Marconi (The diaries of laboratory Guglielmo Marconi.)
- Comitato Guglielmo Marconi International, Bologna, Italy (Marconi's voice)
- Aug. 1914 photo article on Marconi Belmar station in Wall, NJ, InfoAge. (See also, Marconi Period of Significance Historic Buildings.)
- Marconi, Guglielmo: Statue north of Meridian Hill Park in Washington, D.C. by Attilio Piccirilli
- Other
Academic offices | ||
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Preceded by Jan Smuts |
Rector of the University of St Andrews 1934–1937 |
Succeeded by Robert MacGregor Mitchell |
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- Deaths from myocardial infarction
- Italian electrical engineers
- Experimental physicists
- Guglielmo Marconi
- History of telecommunications
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- Italian people of Irish descent
- Members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences
- Members of the Royal Academy of Italy
- National Inventors Hall of Fame inductees
- Nobel laureates in Physics
- People from Bologna
- Radio pioneers
- National Radio Hall of Fame inductees
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- People of the Edwardian era
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- Blue plaques
- Telegraphy