Early Experiments
in Wireless Telegraphy - 1890 to 1900
Nikola
Tesla and other scientists and inventors showed the usefulness of wireless telegraphy, radiotelegraphy, or radio, beginning
in the 1890s. Alexander Stepanovich Popov demonstrated to the public his wireless radio receiver, which was also used as a
lightning detector on May 7, 1895. He proudly demonstrated his wireless receiver before a group of reporters on a stormy August
evening in 1895. It was attached to a long 10 metre pole that he held aloft to maximize the signal. When asked by one of the
reporters if it was a good idea to hold this metal rod in the middle of a storm he replied that all was well. After being
struck (and nearly killed) by a bolt of lightning he proudly announced to the world that his invention also served as a "lightning
detector".
In 1898 Popov
accomplished successful experiments of wireless communication between a naval base and a battleship.
Albert Turpain sent and received his first
radio signal, using Morse code, in France, up to 25 metres in 1895.
Guglielmo Marconi
When we think
of radio, and in particular of shortwave radio, we most naturally reflect on the work of G. Marconi, born
in Italy in 1874, and whose technical endeavours in the late 1890s paved the way for radio broadcasting as we know it today.
Having failed to interest the Italian government,
in 1896 the 22-year-old inventor brought his telegraphy system to Britain and met William Preece, a Welshman, who was a major
figure in the field and Chief Engineer of the General Post Office. A pair of masts about 34 metres (112 ft) high were erected,
at Lavernock Point and on Flat Holm. The receiving mast at Lavernock Point was a 30-metre (98 ft) high pole topped with a
cylindrical cap of zinc connected to a detector with insulated copper wire. At Flat Holm the sending equipment included a
Ruhmkorff coil with an eight-cell battery.
The first trial on May 11 and 12 failed but on the 13th the mast at Lavernock
was extended to 50 metres and the signals, in Morse code, were received clearly. The message sent was "ARE
YOU READY"; the Morse slip signed by Marconi and Kemp is now in the National Museum of Wales.
His
efforts were essentially directed to the establishment of shortwave wireless telegraphy communications facilities on ships
at sea. Along with other researchers, he carried out a wide variety of experiments, confirming Hertz’s (1857-1904) contentions
that wireless waves would pass through solid structures.
Guglielmo Marconi sent and received his
first radio signal in Italy up to 6 km in 1896. On May 13 1897, Marconi, assisted by George
Kemp, a Cardiff Post Office engineer, transmitted the first wireless signals over water to Lavernock (near Penarth in Wales)
from Flat Holm.
In 1900
the crew of the Russian coast defense ship General-Admiral Graf Apraksin as well as stranded Finnish fishermen
were saved in the Gulf of Finland because of exchange of distress telegrams between two radio stations, located at Hogland
island and inside a Russian naval base in Kotka. Both stations of wireless telegraphy were built under Popov's instructions.
