70th Anniversary of Marconi's Death

July 20th is the 70th Anniversary of the death of Guglielmo Marconi, he died in Rome aged 63.

As a tribute, many radio stations throughout the world observe two minutes of silence.

His remains are housed in the Villa Griffone at Sasso Marconi, Emilia-Romagna, which assumed that name in his honour in 1938.

Marconi was born on 25 April 1874, his mother was Annie Jameson, granddaughter of the founder of the Jameson Whiskey distillery.

Fascinated by the idea of using Hertzian waves for telegraphy without wires, wireless telegraphy, he began his experiments in 1894 near Bologna. In early 1896, at the age of 21, Marconi and his mother traveled to London to seek
support for his work. He found his ideas were eagerly received.

In July 1897 the Wireless Telegraph Trading Signal Company was formed with their headquarters in Mark Lane in London and in 1898 the first wireless factory was established in Hall Street, Chelmsford, Essex employing around 50 people.

The distances over which Marconi could communicate rapidly increased and on December 12th of 1901 the letter "S" in Morse was transmitted from Poldhu in Cornwall and received by Marconi personnel in St. John's, New Foundland.

In 1909 he received the Nobel Prize in Physics along with with Karl Ferdinand Braun, "in recognition of their contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy".

As the Hall Street factory became too small for the expanding business the move was made in 1912 to a new purpose built site on the Chelmsford Athletics Ground, in New Street.

July saw the 110th Anniversary of two of Marconi's patents:

2 July 1897 U.K patent No. 12,039,
"Improvements in Transmitting Electrical
Impulses and Signals, and in Apparatus Therefor"

13th July U.S. Patent 0,586,193
"Transmitting electrical signals", (using
Ruhmkorff coil and Morse code key).

Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company

Marconi Calling

Chelmsford the birthplace of radio

The birthplace of broadcasting