Blog #6: The Radio

 The Radio

    The Radio. One of the most influential inventions throughout history. An invention ahead of its time, that allowed people to enjoy media in a whole new way. 

The Invention of the Radio

    The invention of the current day radio can be attributed to 3 different people and their findings within their studies. The first person to contribute to the invention of the radio was Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell. In 1864, Maxwell discovered in his studies that light was an electromagnetic wave, and therefore came up with the theory that other types of waves could actually exist. This theory paved the way for future scientists allowing them to look deeper into Maxwell's theory. The next person to make progress in the invention of the radio as well as make serious strides in science was German physicist Heinrich Hertz. In 1885, Hertz discovered that a copper wire carrying an electric current would give off electromagnetic waves when going back and forth between two zinc spheres. He continued to research these waves and became the very first person to show how to make and detect these electromagnetic waves/radio waves, confirming Maxwell's theory. The radio waves that he discovered are a type of electromagnetic wave that was significantly stronger than most other waves, measured only in kilohertz, megahertz, and gigahertz. Heinrich Hertz is also the reason that waves are measured in the unit "Hertz". The third person to contribute to the invention of the radio was Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi. Marconi studied how to send telegrams wirelessly and was the first to develop a working system commercially. He was able to send and receive the first signals in Italy from about a mile away from each other. While this success was huge, it still didn't catch the eye of the Italian government, so he tried his luck in Britain. There he was much more fortunate in getting the government's attention, and was able to successfully send the first wireless telegraph signal across the English Channel. After that, he tried sending signals to Cape Cod in Massachusetts from England, but the range was too long. He decided to move the location to Newfoundland, Canada and in 1901 he was able to send a single letter "S" across the Atlantic Ocean. With this experiment he successfully created the commercial "radio".

Heinrich Hertz's experiment that discovered the electromagnetic waves Maxwell talked about

The Rise of the Radio

    

    While Marconi was successful in his experiments in 1901, the first radio broadcast didn't come until 1920 in Pittsburg at a station called KDKA. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) created the first radio network in 1922. After this, the popularity of the radio skyrocketed thanks to advertising opportunities and ease of use in the household. By the mid 1930's two thirds of American homes had radios, and by 1939, about 80% of Americans had a radio in their home. Thanks to the radio being wireless unlike much of the technology at the time, they were able to put them into cars, completely changing how people consumed media across the world. The Radio allowed people to spread information to a wide audience, and for the most part the radio was only a positive brought to the world. The only negative effect that the radio could have brought was the ability to spread false information or propaganda, although the days of doing that on the radio is all but gone.  

KDKA transmission room