The beginnings of radio

Samuel F. B. Morse develops the electric telegraph and the code that will bear his name. The first official message (“What hath God wrought”) will be transmitted on 24 May 1844, between Washington and Baltimore.

Carl August von Steinheil experiments with wireless electrical transmission using the conductivity of the earth as a return current — a remarkable insight for the time.

Samuel Morse and James Bowman Lindsay achieve transmission of electrical messages across rivers, exploiting the conductivity of water as a propagation medium.

Wilhelm Feddersen studies the oscillatory nature of the electric spark — work essential to understanding high-frequency waves.

Philipp Reis builds a device that transmits sounds via electricity, which he names the “Telephon”. Though imperfect, it lays the groundwork for the future telephone. Meanwhile, the American Johann Philipp Reis experiments with similar variants.

David Edward Hughes invents the carbon microphone, decisive for the quality of voice transmissions. That same year, Bellinzona (Switzerland) sees the introduction of the théâtrophone: the first opera broadcast over a telephone cable — a direct ancestor of audio streaming.

Paul Nipkow invents the rotating scanning disc, the mechanical basis of future television. That same year, Professor Calzecchi-Onesti (Teramo, Italy) discovers that metal filings alter their conductivity under the influence of electrical waves.

First long-distance musical transmission by telephone, from New York to Philadelphia.

Budapest inaugurates a regular news service by telephone, the “Hirmondó” (Hungarian Telephone Journal) — a forerunner of round-the-clock news radio.

Nikola Tesla develops high-frequency transformers (Tesla coils), indispensable for generating and manipulating radio waves.

Sir Oliver Lodge improves upon Branly’s work and publicly demonstrates wireless signal transmission in Oxford. He will be among the first to use the term “wireless.”

July: at La Spezia, Marconi establishes radio communications with Italian warships at 12 miles. On 20 July, the world’s first commercial wireless company is founded in London: the Wireless Telegraph and Signal Company (capital: £100,000), which will become in 1900 the Marconi’s Wireless Telegraph Company. On 27 August, Adolf Slaby presents Marconi’s work at Potsdam before the German and Spanish emperors. Oliver Lodge files the landmark patent no. 11,575 on syntony (frequency tuning between transmitter and receiver). November: Marconi’s first permanent station at Needles (Isle of Wight); transmission to Bournemouth at 14.5 miles.

3 June: Lord Kelvin sends the first paid radiograms from Needles (in Morse code). 20–22 July: Marconi produces the first live radiotelegraph report from the boat “Flying Huntress,” sending 700 radiograms to the Daily Express during the Kingstown (Dublin) regattas. 26 August: first wireless distress signal sent by a British lightship.

3 March: first maritime rescue operation thanks to radio, following the collision of a steamer and a lightship. 27 March: Marconi bridges the English Channel (Wimereux – South Foreland). 14 July: in Vienna, radio communication between two balloons in flight. July: during British naval manoeuvres, radio exchanges between ships at 85 miles distance.

First military applications of wireless telegraphy during the Boer War in South Africa, providing decisive services to the British army and navy.

18 February: opening of Germany’s first commercial wireless station on the island of Borkum. 26 April: Marconi patent no. 7777 on syntonic telegraphy with coupled circuits. Construction of a powerful Marconi station at Poldhu (Cornwall, England).

Marconi receives messages at 1,551 miles and signals at 2,099 miles aboard the Philadelphia. He discovers the effect of sunlight on wave propagation (the diurnal ionospheric effect, later theorised by Heaviside and Kennelly).

Valdemar Poulsen refines William Duddell’s Musical Arc and creates an electric arc generator for continuous waves, crucial for long-distance transmission. 18 January: President Theodore Roosevelt sends a wireless message to King Edward VII via the Marconi stations at Cape Cod and Poldhu — the first official radio message across the Atlantic. The first newspaper printed aboard a liner (the Campania), fed by news received by radio. 4 August: first International Radiotelegraph Conference, in Berlin.

3 February: inauguration of a transatlantic commercial wireless service between Great Britain and Canada. Second Radiotelegraph Conference in Berlin: the distress signal CQD is replaced by SOS (officially adopted on 1 July 1908).

23 January: after the collision of the Republic with the Florida off the United States coast, a radio call allows all passengers to be rescued before the ship is lost. December: Marconi receives the Nobel Prize in Physics, shared with Karl Ferdinand Braun.

13 January: first artistic radio broadcast from the Metropolitan Opera in New York, featuring Enrico Caruso and Emmy Destinn via Lee De Forest’s radiophone — a pioneering event foreshadowing opera streaming.

Regular radiotelephone service over 350 miles between Nauen (Germany) and Vienna.

11 October: fire aboard the Volturno in mid-Atlantic; ten ships respond to the SOS calls, saving 521 people. International movement to equip all transatlantic liners with radio. November: London “Safety of Life at Sea” Conference (SOLAS, signed 20 January 1914), making radio mandatory on certain categories of vessel. Alexander Meissner develops regenerative coupling, improving receiver sensitivity.

Pioneering experiments in music radiotelephone broadcasting at the Royal Palace of Laeken, in Brussels — foreshadowing future public radio programming.

August: declaration of war. All private radiotelegraphy is immediately suspended in the countries at war.

28 July: first transatlantic radiotelephony experiments by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company and the Western Electric Company (Arlington, USA ↔ Hawaii). 26 October: the Eiffel Tower station receives a radiotelephone message from Arlington (distance: 6,000 km, approximately 3,700 miles).

Marconi and C. S. Franklin conduct decisive experiments on short waves, which will reveal their extraordinary potential for long-distance communications.

Wartime restrictions on private wireless installations are lifted. The Radio Corporation of America (RCA) is founded, following the acquisition of General Electric’s radio division, with participation from Westinghouse and AT&T. Franklin conducts short-wave radiotelephony experiments over 80 miles.

2 July: the broadcast of the Dempsey–Carpentier boxing match from Jersey City gives public radio a decisive boost: thousands of Americans listen live. First broadcasting licences granted in the United States. November: broadcasting begins in France, with transmissions from the Eiffel Tower.

June: Marconi demonstrates the directional properties of short waves with a reflector before the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE, New York). 18 October: the British Broadcasting Company is founded in London. Broadcasting begins in Denmark, the USSR, Canada, and Argentina. November: first commercial and advertising programme broadcast by station WEAF in New York (precursor of sponsored radio).

Directed short-wave transmissions between Poldhu and Marconi’s yacht Elettra (approximately 4,000 km). John Logie Baird begins television experiments that will lead three years later to a low-definition system. Broadcasting begins in Germany, Belgium, Finland, Norway, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia, and Australia.

Austria, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, and South Africa launch their first radio stations. The United States authorises 1,105 broadcasting stations. Marconi introduces the Beam System: parabolic reflectors used to direct short waves across the British Empire. 30 May: radio telephone link between Great Britain and Australia. June: first “beam-message” from London to Buenos Aires.

Broadcasting is established in Hungary, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Mexico, and Japan. 3 April: the International Broadcasting Union (IBU) is founded in Geneva, forerunner of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). July: the Daventry station opens — the first high-power European radio transmitter. C. F. Jenkins transmits silhouettes and animated images from Washington — the first steps towards television broadcasting.

International Radio-Telegraph Conference in Washington. The Federal Radio Commission is established in the United States — the first regulator of the radio spectrum. The IBU Control Centre is set up in Brussels. 18 September: the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) is founded — NBC’s future rival. Bell Telephone Laboratories and AT&T stage the first television demonstrations between New York and Washington.

Broadcasting begins in French Morocco. October: the landing of the Graf Zeppelin at Lakehurst (after its first transatlantic crossing) is broadcast live on short wave from Schenectady — the first international radio broadcast of an aeronautical event. Simultaneous transmission by 30 stations (France, Austria, Poland, Czechoslovakia) of a performance of Smetana’s The Bartered Bride from the Opéra-Comique in Paris. November: 45 European stations relay Viennese programmes for the Schubert centenary.

January: Brussels Plan — the first major revision of the Geneva Plan for the allocation of radio frequencies in Europe. April: Prague Plan, drawn up by the European Conference of PTT Administrations. 19 May: Germany retransmits part of its programme to Buenos Aires via its short-wave station on the occasion of a wireless exhibition. June: the Second World Power Conference in Berlin hears speeches broadcast live by radio from several cities in America and England. John Logie Baird gives the first demonstration of colour television (still experimental).