Tube: The Invention of TelevisionIn the half century since its commercial unveiling, television has become the undisputed master of communications media, revolutionizing the way postwar generations have viewed the world. Yet almost no one in America knows how television was created, who created it, or how it actually works. The inventors of television were a diverse group of iconoclasts from different corners of the world - including an Idaho farm boy turned college dropout, an eccentric, sickly Scotsman, and two Russian Americans. These men - Philo T. Farnsworth, John Logie Baird, Charles Francis Jenkins, Ernst Alexanderson, Vladimir Zworykin, and the corporate visionary David Sarnoff - each had one eye on the others as they raced for fortune and scientific glory. Tube traces their progress, from the laboratory prototypes that drew public laughter to the vicious courtroom battles for control of what would become an enormous market power. Taking us through the advent of "living color" and beyond, authors David E. Fisher and Marshall Jon Fisher conclude with a forecast of the latest digital technologies and their impact. |
Contents
A Note from the General | 3 |
ONE The Dream | 9 |
TWO Puir Johnnie 21 | 21 |
Copyright | |
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Abramson Alexanderson all-electronic American announced apparatus April Baird Television began Berlin Bilby black-and-white broadcasting build called camera tube cathode cathode-ray tube color system commercial television Corporation David Sarnoff demonstration elec electrical electron beam electronic television Elma Farnsworth engineer Ernst Alexanderson Everson experimental Farns Farnsworth lab Fernseh film finally going Goldmark HDTV Iconoscope idea Image Dissector industry invention inventor Jenkins John Logie Baird Kinescope laboratory later light London Marconi McCargar mechanical mechanical television memo months mosaic moving never Nipkow disk NTSC operating patent Phil Philadelphia Philo Philo Farnsworth photoelectric picture president problem produced radio RCA's San Francisco scanning scene scientists screen selenium signal sion station tele television research television system tion took transmission transmitting turned Udelson vision Vladimir Zworykin wave Westinghouse wireless wires wrote York Zworykin