The Wireless Revolution

What once seemed like magic became reality when Guglielmo Marconi sent the first wireless signals across the Atlantic in 1901. Radio soon carried news, music, and voices worldwide, powered by breakthroughs like the radio tube and transistor.

Wireless transmission and Radio

Wireless transmission became popular, especially for shipping, and the person who probably made the most money from the radiotelegraph was Guglielmo Marconi (Nobel Prize 1909). He is said to be the first to transmit radiotelegraphy across the Atlantic (1901). Radio traffic all over the world with information and entertainment (broadcasting) was quickly built up.

The radio tube was invented by Ambrose Fleming and Lee de Forest (1904) and made it possible to amplify weak radio signals. This meant that one could now get a better range of radio transmissions and to send speech and music. Not just telegraph messages. The radio tube was later replaced by the transistor, a semiconductor (Schokley, Brattain, Bardeen 1948). An electronic component that can do the same job as the tube, but it is smaller, cheaper and can be powered by batteries. The radio receiver could now be taken anywhere. The transistor radio came in the 60s.

Radio beacons began to appear in the early 1920s. An important aid for sea and air travel, especially in bad weather, for example landing in the dark and snowstorms. Today we have ILS, GPS, STDMA and other radio-based navigation systems.

Karl Jansky (1933) creates what may be the first radio telescope, to receive radio signals from stars and galaxies, which has taught us a lot about the processes of space. Radar (RAdio Detection And Ranging) is developed during the 1930s and proved to be of crucial importance during the Second World War. An early microwave, related to radar, came in 1956.

Today, wireless technology, used in cell phones and Wi-Fi, is considered "simple." In 1872, it was magical.