Who invented the radio?

Who invented the radio?

Radio owes its development to two other inventions the telegraph and the telephone. In fact, all three technologies are closely related. Few radio broadcasts travel through the air exclusively, while many are sent over telephone wires. In the 1980s James Clerk, Maxwell, a Scottish physicist, predicted the existence of radio waves, and in 1886 Heinrich Rudolph Hertz, a German physicist, demonstrated that rapid variations of electric current could be projected into space in the form of radio waves, similar to those of light and heat.

Guglielmo Marconi, an Italian inventor proved the feasibility of radio communication. He sent, and received his first radio signal in Italy in 1895. By 1899, he flashed the first wireless signal across the English Channel, and two days later received the letter ‘S’, telegraphed from England to Newfoundland. This was the first successful transatlantic radio-telegraph message in 1902.

Nikola Tesla is now credited with having invented the modern radio. The Supreme Court of the US overturned Marconi’s patent in 1943 in favor of Tesla. Wireless signals proved effective in communication for rescue work when a sea disaster occurred. A number of ocean liners installed wireless equipment. In 1899, the United States Army established wireless communication with a lightship off Fire Island, New York. Tow years later, the Navy adopted a wireless system. Up to then, the Navy had been using visual signaling and homing pigeons for communication.