Giuseppe, who was a widower with a son, Luigi, married Annie on 16 April 1864 inBoulogne-sur-Mer, France. Alfonso, Marconi's older brother, was born the following year.
Between the ages of two and six, Guglielmo and Alfonso lived with their mother inBedford, England. Having an Irish mother helped explain his many activities inGreat Britain and Ireland.
On 4 May 1877, when Marconi was age 3, his father decided to obtain British citizenship; Marconi could have thus also opted for British citizenship anytime, as both his parents were British citizens.[16]
Marconi did not receive any formal education during his youth.[17][18][19] Instead, he learned chemistry, mathematics, and physics at home from a series of private tutors hired by his parents; his family hired additional tutors for him in the winter when they would leave Bologna for the warmer climate ofTuscany orFlorence.[19] An important mentor was Vincenzo Rosa, a high school physics teacher inLivorno.[20][18] Rosa taught the 17-year-old Marconi the basics of physical phenomena as well as new theories on electricity.
At the age of 18, Marconi returned to Bologna and became acquainted withAugusto Righi, a physics professor at theUniversity of Bologna, who had done research onHeinrich Hertz's work. Righi permitted Marconi to attend lectures at the university and also to use the university's laboratory and library.[21][22]
Have I done the world good, or have I added a menace?[23]
From youth, Marconi was interested in science and electricity. In the early 1890s, he began working on the idea of "wireless telegraphy" – i.e., the transmission of telegraph messages without connecting wires as used by theelectric telegraph. This was not a new idea; numerous investigators and inventors had been exploring wireless telegraph technologies and even building systems using electricconduction,electromagnetic induction and optical (light) signalling for over 50 years, but none had proved technically and commercially successful. A relatively new development came fromHeinrich Hertz, who, in 1888, demonstrated that one could produce and detectelectromagnetic radiation, based on the work ofJames Clerk Maxwell. At the time, this radiation was commonly called "Hertzian waves", and is now generally referred to asradio waves.[24]
There was a great deal of interest in radio waves in the physics community, but this interest was in the scientific phenomenon, not in its potential as a communication method. Physicists generally looked on radio waves as an invisible form of light that could only travel along aline of sight path, limiting its range to the visual horizon like existing forms of visual signalling.[25] Hertz's death in 1894 brought published reviews of his earlier discoveries including a demonstration on the transmission and detection of radio waves by the British physicistOliver Lodge and an article about Hertz's work byAugusto Righi. Righi's article renewed Marconi's interest in developing a wireless telegraphy system based on radio waves,[26] a line of inquiry that Marconi noted other inventors did not seem to be pursuing.[27]
Marconi's first transmitter incorporating amonopole antenna. It consisted of an elevated copper sheet(top) connected to a Righi spark gap(left) powered by aninduction coil(centre) with atelegraph key(right) to switch it on and off to spell out text messages inMorse code.
At the age of 20, Marconi began to conduct experiments on radio waves, building much of his own equipment in the attic of his home at the Villa Griffone in Pontecchio (now an administrative subdivision ofSasso Marconi), Italy, with the help of his butler, Mignani. Marconi built on Hertz's original experiments and, at the suggestion of Righi, began using acoherer, an early detector based on the 1890 findings of French physicistÉdouard Branly and used in Lodge's experiments, thatchanged resistance when exposed to radio waves.[28] In the summer of 1894, he built a storm alarm made up of a battery, a coherer, and an electric bell, which went off when it picked up the radio waves generated by lightning.
Late one night, in December 1894, Marconi demonstrated a radio transmitter and receiver to his mother, a set-up that made a bell ring on the other side of the room by pushing a telegraphic button on a bench.[29][28] Supported by his father, Marconi continued to read through the literature and picked up on the ideas of physicists who were experimenting with radio waves. He developed devices, such as portable transmitters and receiver systems, that could work over long distances,[27] turning what was essentially a laboratory experiment into a useful communication system.[30] Marconi came up with a functional system with many components:[31]
Awire or metal sheet capacity area suspended at a height above the ground;
Acoherer receiver, which was a modification ofÉdouard Branly's original device with refinements to increase sensitivity and reliability;
Atelegraph key to operate the transmitter to send short and long pulses, corresponding to the dots-and-dashes ofMorse code; and
A telegraph register activated by thecoherer which recorded the receivedMorse code dots and dashes onto a roll of paper tape.
In the summer of 1895, Marconi moved his experiments outdoors on his father's estate in Bologna. He tried different arrangements and shapes of antenna but even with improvements he was able to transmit signals only up to 800 metres (0.5 mile), a distance Oliver Lodge had predicted in 1894 as the maximum transmission distance for radio waves.[32]
A breakthrough came in the summer of 1895, when Marconi found that a much greater range could be achieved after he raised the height of his antenna and, borrowing from a technique used in wired telegraphy,grounded his transmitter and receiver. With these improvements, the system was capable of transmitting signals up to 2 miles (3.2 km) and over hills.[33][34] Themonopole antenna reduced the frequency of the waves compared to thedipole antennas used by Hertz, and radiatedvertically polarized radio waves which could travel longer distances. By this point, he concluded that a device could become capable of spanning greater distances, with additional funding and research, and would prove valuable both commercially and militarily. Marconi's experimental apparatus proved to be the first engineering-complete, commercially successfulradio transmission system.[35][36][37]
Marconi applied to the Italian Ministry of Post and Telegraphs, then under the direction of Maggiorino Ferraris,[38] explaining his wireless telegraph machine and asking for funding, but never received a response. An apocryphal tale claims that the minister (incorrectly named first as Emilio Sineo, later as Pietro Lacava[39]) wrote "to the Longara" on the document, referring to the insane asylum on Via della Lungara in Rome, but the letter was never found.[40]
In 1896, Marconi spoke with his family friend Carlo Gardini, Honorary Consul at the United States Consulate in Bologna, about leaving Italy to go toGreat Britain. Gardini wrote a letter of introduction to the Ambassador of Italy in London, Annibale Ferrero, explaining who Marconi was and about his extraordinary discoveries. In his response, Ambassador Ferrero advised them not to reveal Marconi's results until after a patent was obtained. He also encouraged Marconi to come to Britain, where he believed it would be easier to find the necessary funds to convert his experiments into practical use. Finding little interest or appreciation for his work in Italy, Marconi travelled toLondon in early 1896 at the age of 21, accompanied by his mother, to seek support for his work. (He spoke fluent English in addition to Italian.) Marconi arrived atDover, and the Customs officer opened his case to find various apparatuses. The customs officer immediately contactedthe Admiralty in London. With worries in the UK about Italian anarchists and suspicion Marconi was importing a bomb, his equipment was destroyed.
While in the UK, Marconi gained the interest and support ofWilliam Preece, the Chief Electrical Engineer of theGeneral Post Office (the GPO). Marconi applied for a patent on 2 June 1896. British Patent number 12039 titled "Improvements in Transmitting Electrical impulses and Signals, and in Apparatus therefor", which became the first patent for a communication system based on radio waves.[41]
British Post Office engineers inspect Marconi's radio equipment during a demonstration onFlat Holm Island, 13 May 1897. The transmitter is at the centre, the coherer receiver below it, and the pole supporting the wire antenna is visible at top.
Marconi made the first demonstration of his system for the British government in July 1896.[42] A further series of demonstrations for the British followed, and, by March 1897, Marconi had transmitted Morse code signals over a distance of about 3 miles (5 km) acrossSalisbury Plain. On 13 May 1897, Marconi sent the first ever wireless communication over the open sea – a message was transmitted over theBristol Channel fromFlat Holm Island toLavernock Point nearCardiff, a distance of 3 miles (4.8 km). The message read "Are you ready".[43] The transmitting equipment was almost immediately relocated toBrean Down Fort on theSomerset coast, stretching the range to 10 miles (16 km).
Plaque on the outside of theBT Centre commemorates Marconi's first public transmission of wireless signals.
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 theToynbee Hall on 11 December 1896; and "Signalling through Space without Wires", given to theRoyal Institution on 4 June 1897.[44][45]
Numerous additional demonstrations followed, and Marconi began to receive international attention. In July 1897, he carried out a series of tests atLa Spezia, in his home country, for the Italian government. A test forLloyd's between The Marine Hotel inBallycastle andRathlin Island, both inCounty Antrim inUlster,Ireland, was conducted on 6 July 1898 byGeorge Kemp andEdward Edwin Glanville.[46] A transmission across theEnglish Channel was accomplished on 27 March 1899, fromWimereux, France toSouth Foreland Lighthouse, England. Marconi set up an experimental base at theHaven Hotel,Sandbanks,Poole Harbour,Dorset, where he erected a 100-foot high mast. He became friends with the van Raaltes, the owners ofBrownsea Island in Poole Harbour, and his steam yacht, theElettra, was often moored on Brownsea or at The Haven Hotel. Marconi purchased the vessel after the Great War and converted it to a seaborne laboratory from where he conducted many of his experiments. Among theElettra's crew wasAdelmo Landini, his personal radio operator, who was also an inventor.[47]
In December 1898, the British lightship service authorised the establishment of wireless communication between theSouth Foreland lighthouse atDover and the East Goodwinlightship, twelve miles distant. On 17 March 1899, the East Goodwin lightship sent the firstwireless distress signal, a signal on behalf of the merchant vesselElbe which had run aground onGoodwin Sands. The message was received by the radio operator of the South Foreland lighthouse, who summoned the aid of theRamsgate lifeboat.[48][49]
SSPonce entering New York Harbor 1899, by Milton J. Burns
In 1899, Marconi sailed to the United States at the invitation ofThe New York Herald newspaper to coverthat year's America's Cup international yacht races offSandy Hook, New Jersey. His first demonstration was a transmission from aboard the SSPonce, a passenger ship of thePorto Rico Line.[50] Marconi left forEngland on 8 November 1899 on theAmerican Line'sSS Saint Paul, and he and his assistants installed wireless equipment aboard during the voyage. Marconi's wireless brought news of theSecond Boer War, which had begun a month before their departure, to passengers at the request of "some of the officials of the American line."[51] On 15 November theSS Saint Paul became the first ocean liner to report her imminent return to Great Britain by wireless when Marconi's Royal Needles Hotel radio station contacted her 66 nautical miles off the English coast. The firstTransatlantic Times, a newspaper containing wireless transmission news from the Needles Station at the Isle of Wight, was published on board the SSSaint Paul before its arrival.[52]
At the turn of the 20th century, Marconi began investigating a means to signal across the Atlantic to compete with thetransatlantic telegraph cables. Marconi established a wireless transmitting station at Marconi House,Rosslare Strand,County Wexford, in 1901 to act as a link betweenPoldhu inCornwall, England, andClifden inConnemara,County Galway, Ireland. He soon made the announcement that the message was received atSignal Hill inSt. John's,Newfoundland (now part ofCanada), on 12 December 1901, using a 500-foot (150 m) kite-supported antenna for reception – signals transmitted by the company's new high-power station atPoldhu, Cornwall. The distance between the two points was about 2,200 miles (3,500 km). It was heralded as a great scientific advance, yet there also was – and continues to be – considerable scepticism about this claim. The exact wavelength used is not known, but it is fairly reliably determined to have been in the neighbourhood of 350 metres (frequency ≈ 850 kHz). The tests took place at a time of day during which the entire transatlantic path was in daylight. It is now known (although Marconi did not know then) that this was the worst possible choice. At this medium wavelength, long-distance transmission in the daytime is not possible because of the heavy absorption of the skywave in the ionosphere. It was not a blind test; Marconi knew in advance to listen for a repetitive signal of three clicks, signifying the Morse code letterS. The clicks were reported to have been heard faintly and sporadically. There was no independent confirmation of the reported reception, and the transmissions 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. The Poldhu transmitter was a two-stage circuit.[54][55]
Marconi demonstrating apparatus he used in his first long-distance radio transmissions in the 1890s. The transmitter is at the right, the receiver with paper tape recorder at the left.Marconi caricatured byLeslie Ward forVanity Fair magazine, 1905
Feeling challenged by sceptics, Marconi prepared a better-organised and documented test. In February 1902, the SSPhiladelphia sailed west from Great Britain with Marconi aboard, carefully recording signals sent daily from the Poldhu station. The test results producedcoherer-tape reception up to 1,550 miles (2,490 km), and audio reception up to 2,100 miles (3,400 km). The maximum distances were achieved at night, and these tests were the first to show that radio signals formedium wave andlongwave transmissions travel much farther at night than during the day. During the daytime, signals had been received up to only about 700 miles (1,100 km), 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 (miles), despite some scientists' belief that they were limited essentially to line-of-sight distances.
On 17 December 1902, a transmission from the Marconi station inGlace Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada, became the world's first radio message to cross the Atlantic from North America. In 1901, Marconi built a station nearSouth Wellfleet, Massachusetts, that sent a message of greetings on 18 January 1903 from United States PresidentTheodore Roosevelt to KingEdward VII of the United Kingdom. However, consistent transatlantic signalling was difficult to establish.[56]
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, he established a commercial service 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[57][58] betweenClifden, Ireland, andGlace Bay, but even after this the company struggled for many years to provide reliable communication to others.
The role played by Marconi Co. wireless in maritime rescues raised public awareness of the value of radio and brought fame to Marconi, particularly the sinking ofRMSTitanic on 15 April 1912 andRMSLusitania on 7 May 1915.[59]
RMSTitanic radio operatorsJack Phillips andHarold Bride were not employed by theWhite Star Line but by theMarconi International Marine Communication Company. After the sinking of the ocean liner, survivors were rescued by theRMSCarpathia of theCunard Line.[60]Carpathia took a total of 17 minutes to both receive and decode the SOS signal sent byTitanic. There was a distance of 93km (58 miles) between the two ships.[61] WhenCarpathia docked in New York, Marconi went aboard with a reporter fromThe New York Times to talk with Bride, the surviving operator.[60] After this incident, Marconi gained popularity and became more recognised for his contributions to the field of radio and wireless technology.[62]
On 18 June 1912, Marconi gave evidence to the Court of Inquiry into the loss ofTitanic regarding the marine telegraphy's functions and the procedures for emergencies at sea.[63] Britain'sPostmaster-General summed up, referring to theTitanic disaster: "Those who have been saved, have been saved through one man, Mr. Marconi ... and his marvellous invention."[64] Marconi was offered free passage onTitanic before she sank, but had takenLusitania three days earlier. As his daughter Degna later explained, he had paperwork to do and preferred the public stenographer aboard that vessel.[65]
Sir J. C. Bose's Diode Detector and Marconi's First Transatlantic Wireless Signal
InGuglielmo Marconi's historic transatlantic wireless communication experiment on 12 December 1901, the inaugural signal—consisting of theMorse code letter "S"—was received atSignal Hill inSt. John's, Newfoundland, employing a mercury coherer detector connected to a telephone receiver.[66][67][68] This self-restoring detector, essential for signal detection without mechanical decohering, was devised by SirJagadish Chandra Bose, a professor atPresidency College, Calcutta.[69] Bose initially described this iron-mercury-iron or iron-mercury-carbon contact apparatus in a paper submitted to theRoyal Society on 27 April 1899, acknowledged as the earliest patented solid-state diode detector (British Patent No. 7555, 1901; U.S. Patent 755840, 1904).[69][70] The exhaustive inquiry into this invention and its application in Marconi's experiment is documented in a 1998 paper by Probir K. Bondyopadhyay, published by theInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).[71]
Marconi procured the detector during the summer of 1901 from Lieutenant Luigi Solari of theRoyal Italian Navy, who adapted Bose's configuration by encapsulating a mercury droplet between carbon or iron electrodes within a glass tube.[72] Marconi submitted a British patent application (No. 18105, September 1901) under his own name, subsequently revised to attribute the communication to Solari.[73][74] The employment of this apparatus precipitated the "Italian Navy Coherer" scandal, initiated when Professor Angelo Banti, editor ofL'Elettricista, asserted in May 1902 that naval signalman Paolo Castelli was its originator.[75] This contention engendered discussions in British periodicals, such asThe Electrician andSaturday Review.[76][77][78][79] Solari repudiated Castelli's attribution, indicating that his inspiration derived from English scholarly sources, presumably Bose's 1899 publication.[80][81]
In 1903, Emilio Guarini proposed that Professor Tommaso Tommasina ofGenoa held precedence, referencing his experiments from 1899 to 1900.[82][83] Nevertheless, Marconi's lecture at theRoyal Institution on 13 June 1902 delineated Tommasina's contributions as separate, and Solari affirmed unawareness of Tommasina's research until subsequent to the address.[84][81] Tommasina's investigations, succeeding Bose's, omitted the telephone component.[72] Marconi's exchanges withJohn Ambrose Fleming and subsequent narratives eschewed acknowledgment of Bose, potentially attributable to patent considerations.[85][67]
Bose's detector constituted a foundational element in nascent wireless technology, enabling Marconi's accomplishment, although its provenance was eclipsed by the controversy and Marconi's deliberate equivocations.[86][87] The affair, meticulously analyzed in Bondyopadhyay's 1998 IEEE paper, illuminates intricate matters of attribution and innovation within the emergent domain of radio communication.[71][72][88]
Share of the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America, issued 20 August 1913
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 be used only for radio-telegraph operations, long after it was apparent that the future of radio communication lay withcontinuous-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). TheNew Street Works factory inChelmsford was the location for the first entertainment radiobroadcasts in theUnited Kingdom in 1920, employing a vacuum tube transmitter and featuringDame Nellie Melba. In 1922, regular entertainment broadcasts commenced from theMarconi Research Centre atGreat Baddow, forming the prelude to theBBC, and he spoke of the close association of aviation and wireless telephony in that same year at a private gathering withFlorence Tyzack Parbury, and even spoke of interplanetary wireless communication. In 1924, the Marconi Company co-established theUnione Radiofonica Italiana (nowRAI).[89]
In his lecture, he stated: "I reclaim the honour of being the first fascist in the field of radiotelegraphy, the first who acknowledged the utility of joining the electric rays in a bundle, as Mussolini was the first in the political field who acknowledged the necessity of merging all the healthy energies of the country into a bundle, for the greater greatness of Italy".[94] Documents that came to light in 2002 showed Marconi colluded with Mussolini's campaign against Jews, not allowing them to join the Royal Academy during the 1930s.[95]
While helping to developmicrowave technology, Marconi suffered nineheart attacks in the span of three years preceding his death.[96] Following the ninth heart attack, he died on 20 July 1937 inRome at the age of 63. Astate funeral was held for him. As a tribute, shops on the street where he lived were "Closed for national mourning".[97] In addition, at 6 pm the next day, the time designated for the funeral, transmitters around the world observed two minutes of silence in his honour.[98] The British Post Office also sent a message requesting that all broadcasting ships honour Marconi with two minutes of broadcasting silence.[97] His remains are housed at theMausoleum of Guglielmo Marconi inSasso Marconi, Emilia-Romagna, which assumed that name in his honour in 1938.[99]
In 1943, Marconi's steam yacht,Elettra, was commandeered and refitted as a warship by the GermanKriegsmarine. The following year, she was sunk by the BritishRoyal Air Force on 22 January. After the war, the Italian government tried to retrieve the wreckage to rebuild the boat; the wreckage was removed to Italy. Eventually, the idea was abandoned, and the wreckage was cut into pieces which were distributed amongst Italian museums.
In 1943, theSupreme Court of the United States handed down a decision on Marconi's radio patents restoring some of the prior patents ofOliver Lodge,John Stone Stone, andNikola Tesla.[100][101] The decision was not about Marconi's original radio patents,[102] and the court declared that their decision had no bearing on Marconi's claim as the first to achieve radio transmission, just that since Marconi's claim to certain patents was questionable; he could not claim infringement on those same patents.[103] There are claims the high court was trying to nullify a World War I claim against the United States government by the Marconi Company via simply restoring the non-Marconi prior patent.[100]
Guglielmo and his first wife, Beatrice Marconic. 1910American electrical engineerAlfred Norton Goldsmith and Marconi on 26 June 1922
Marconi was a friend of Charles and Florence van Raalte, the owners ofBrownsea Island, and of their daughter, Margherita. In 1904, he met Margherita's Irish friend, The Hon. BeatriceO'Brien (1882–1976), the daughter ofEdward O'Brien, 14th Baron Inchiquin. On 16 March 1905, Guglielmo and Beatrice were married, and spent their honeymoon on Brownsea Island.[104] They had three daughters; Lucia (born and died 1906), Degna (1908–1998), and Gioia (1916–1996); and a son, Giulio (1910–1971), who became 2nd Marquess. In 1913, the family returned to Italy and became part of Rome society; Beatrice served as alady-in-waiting toQueen Elena. At Marconi's request, his marriage to Beatrice was annulled on 27 April 1927, so he could remarry.[105]
Marconi wanted to marryMaria Cristina Bezzi-Scali [it] (2 April 1900 – 15 July 1994), the only daughter of Francesco,Count Bezzi-Scali. To do this, he had to be confirmed in theCatholic faith and became a devout member of the Church.[106] He had been baptised Catholic but was brought up as a member of theAnglican Church. On 12 June 1927, he married Maria in a civil service, with a religious ceremony performed on 15 June. He was 53-years-old, while Maria was only 27. They had one daughter, Maria Elettra Elena Anna (born 1930), goddaughter of Queen Elena, who married Prince Carlo Giovannelli (1942–2016) in 1966; they later divorced.[107] 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.[108]
In 1931, Marconi personally introduced the first radio broadcast of a Pope,Pius XI, and announced 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".[109]
A large collection of Marconi artefacts was held byThe General Electric Company, plc (GEC) of the United Kingdom which later renamed itself Marconi plc and Marconi Corporation plc. In December 2004 the extensive Marconi Collection, held at the former Marconi Research Centre atGreat Baddow,Chelmsford, Essex UK was donated to the nation by the Company via theUniversity of Oxford.[110] This consisted of the BAFTA award-winning MarconiCalling website, some 250+ physical artefacts and the massive ephemera collection of papers, books, patents and many other items. The artefacts are now held byThe Museum of the History of Science and the ephemera Archives by the nearbyBodleian Library.[111] Following three years' work at the Bodleian, an Online Catalogue to the Marconi Archives was released in November 2008.
In 1990, theBank of Italy issued aLire 2,000 banknote featuring his portrait on the front and on the back his accomplishments.[125]
In 2001, Great Britain released a commemorative£2 coin celebrating the 100th anniversary of Marconi's first wireless communication.[126]
Marconi's early experiments in wireless telegraphy were the subject of twoIEEE Milestones; one in Switzerland in 2003[127] and most recently in Italy in 2011.[128]
In 2009, Italy issued a commemorative silver 10 Euro coin honouring the centennial of Marconi's Nobel Prize.[129]
Guglielmo Marconi Memorial in Washington, D.C.Bronze statue of Guglielmo Marconi, sculpted by Saleppichi Giancarlo erected 1975Philadelphia, PennsylvaniaItalian100 lire coin from 1974 commemorating the centenary of Marconi's birth
A granite obelisk stands on the cliff top near the site of Marconi'sMarconi's Poldhu Wireless Station in Cornwall, commemorating the first transatlantic transmission.
Marconi Plaza Park, an urban park square named after the inventor in 1937, is locatedPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania at Oregon Ave and South Broad Street. It includes a later 1975 bronze statue of Marconi erected on the east side.
The Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company of Canada (nowCMC Electronics andUltra Electronics), ofMontreal, Quebec, Canada, was created in 1903 by Guglielmo Marconi.[134] In 1925 the company was renamed to the 'Canadian Marconi Company', which was acquired byEnglish Electric in 1953.[134] The company name changed again toCMC Electronics Inc. (French: CMC Électronique) in 2001. In 2002, the company's historical radio business was sold to Ultra Electronics to become Ultra Electronics TCS Inc., now doing business as Ultra Communications. Both CMC Electronics and Ultra Communications are still located in Montreal.
TheMarconi National Historic Sites of Canada was created byParks 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 inGlace Bay, Nova Scotia, at Table Head on Timmerman Street.
The Marconi Wireless Company of America, the world's first radio company, was incorporated in Roselle Park New Jersey, on West Westfield Avenue, on 22 November 1899.
British patent No. 12,039 (1897) "Improvements in Transmitting Electrical impulses and Signals, and in Apparatus therefor". 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).
British patent No. 7,777 (1900) "Improvements in Apparatus for Wireless Telegraphy". Date of Application 26 April 1900; Complete Specification Left, 25 February 1901; Accepted, 13 April 1901.
British patent No. 5113 (1904) "Improvements in Transmitters suitable for Wireless Telegraphy". Date of Application 1 March 1904; Complete Specification Left, 30 November 1904; Accepted, 19 January August 1905.
British patent No. 21640 (1904) "Improvements in Apparatus for Wireless Telegraphy". Date of Application 8 October 1904; Complete Specification Left, 6 July 1905; Accepted, 10 August 1905.
British patent No. 14788 (1904) "Improvements in or relating to Wireless Telegraphy". Date of Application 18 July 1905; Complete Specification Left, 23 January 1906; Accepted, 10 May 1906.
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^Fleming, J. A. (1934).Memories of a Scientific Life. London: Marshall, Morgan and Scott. p. 124.
^Bose, J. C. (1927).Collected Physical Papers. New York: Longmans Green.
^Bondyopadhyay, P. K. (4–7 September 1995).Guglielmo Marconi—The father of long distance radio communication—An engineer's tribute. Proc. 25th European Microwave Conf., Special Historical Session. Vol. 2. Bologna, Italy. pp. 879–885.
^Dam, H. J. W. (March 1897). "Telegraphing without wires. A possibility of electrical science".McClure's Magazine.VIII (5):383–392.
Marconi, Degna,My Father, Marconi, James Lorimer & Co, 1982.ISBN0-919511-14-7 (Italian version):Marconi, mio padre, Di Renzo Editore, 2008,ISBN88-8323-206-2.
Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company,Year book of wireless telegraphy and telephony, London, England: Published for the Marconi Press Agency Limited., by the St. Catherine Press / Wireless Press.LCCN14-17875.
Ahern, Steve (ed),Making Radio (2nd Edition) Allen & Unwin, Sydney, Australia, 2006ISBN9781741149128.
Aitken, Hugh G.J.,Syntony and Spark: The Origins of Radio, New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1976.ISBN0-471-01816-3.
Aitken, Hugh G.J.,The Continuous Wave: Technology and American Radio, 1900–1932, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1985.ISBN0-691-08376-2.
Clark, Paddy, "Marconi's Irish Connections Recalled," published in100 Years of Radio, IEE Conference Publication 411, 1995.
Coe, Douglas and Kreigh Collins (ills),Marconi, pioneer of radio, New York, J. Messner, Inc., 1943.LCCN43-10048.
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.ISBN0-85296-845-0LCCN94-11611
Geddes, Keith,Guglielmo Marconi, 1874–1937, London : H.M.S.O., A Science Museum booklet, 1974.ISBN0-11-290198-0LCCN75-329825 (ed. Obtainable in the United States. 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.
Homer, Peter and O'Connor, Finbar,Marconi Wireless Radio Station: Malin Head from 1902, 2014.
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, Italy: Marsilio.
Jolly, W.P.,Marconi, 1972.
Larson, Erik,Thunderstruck, New York: Crown Publishers, 2006.ISBN1-4000-8066-5 A comparison of the lives ofHawley Harvey Crippen and Marconi. Crippen was a murderer whose Transatlantic escape was foiled by the new invention of shipboard radio.
MacLeod, Mary K.,Marconi: The Canada Years – 1902–1946, Halifax, Nova Scotia: Nimbus Publishing Limited, 1992,ISBN1551093308.
Masini, Giancarlo,Guglielmo Marconi, Turin: Turinese typographical-publishing union, 1975.LCCN77-472455 (ed. Contains 32 tables outside of the text).
Mason, H.B. (1908).Encyclopaedia of ships and shipping,Wireless Telegraphy. London: Shipping Encyclopaedia. 1908.
Paul M. Hawkins – "Point to Point – A History of International Telecommunications During the Radio Years"ISBN978-178719-6278 pub. by New Generation Publishing.
Paul M. Hawkins & Paul G. Reyland – "Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Stations in Essex – The Centenary of Brentwood and Ongar Radio Stations"ISBN978-180369-3828 by – pub. 2022 by New Generation Publishing.
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, Massachusetts : Da Capo Press, 2003.ISBN0-306-81275-4
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 United States government during World War I.
Robert (Bob) White,Guglielmo Marconi – Aerial Assistance with a Kite. Bridging the Atlantic By Wireless Signal – 12 December 1901. Kiting,The Journal of the American Kitefliers Association. Vol. 23, Iss. 5 – Winter 2002 November 2001
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