Who Invented the Radio

March 31, 2009 by Mary Wayne

Who invented the radio? The first person credited for the invention of the radio was Guglielmo Marconi, but was found to have used seventeen of Nikola Tesla’s patents. The distinction was later on granted to Nikola Tesla, since he had invented the fundamentals of radio transmission well before Guglielmo Marconi even thought of it.

The first radio was called a wireless telegraph and the first demonstration of the precursor to the modern radio was made on August 14, 1894. In 1896, Guglielmo Marconi then was awarded a patent for his improvements in transmitting electrical impulses and signals for apparatus, which became the radio. He also operated the world’s first radio station and opened the first “wireless” factory in 1898.

Marconi’s system was further developed by Westinghouse engineers by the creation of the vacuum tube detector. On Christmas Eve in 1906, Reginald Fessenden used a transmitter to make the first program broadcast which was caught by ships at sea. The first broadcast had Fessenden playing O Holy Night and reading a passage from the Bible.