Invention of the Wireless Communication Engine

Wireless technology, taken for granted today, was once an innovative wonder that would forever change how the world communicates. Developed by Guglielmo Marconi in the latter half of the nineteenth century, wireless telegraphy combined advancements made by Samuel Morse, William Cooke, Charles Wheatstone, Alexander Graham Bell, and countless others to lay the foundation for the modern wireless world.

Intrigued and fascinated by the new phenomenon of electricity, Marconi began to experiment with electric sparks in his attic workshop. In the Apennine Hills south of Bologna, Italy, his parents were the first to hear a bell ring without the aid of wires. By the time he was twenty-two, Marconi had perfected his methods. He took his revolutionary invention to England in 1896 to share it with the world.

Not everyone received his creation favorably, however, especially after Marconi created the Wireless Telegraph & Signaling Company. In the midst of the Italian unification and Second Industrial Revolution, Marconi faced his own patent and monopoly wars with British, German, and American adversaries. The innovation of wireless communication, despite making the world more technologically unified than ever before, caused societal rifts and transformations that would impact the modern world for generations.

B. J. G. van der Kooij is the author of the Invention series, a collection of historical analyses documenting groundbreaking technologies. He obtained his MBA from the Rotterdam School of Management in 1975 and then an MSEE with a focus on microelectronics from Delft University of Technology in 1977. Over the course of an illustrious career, he served as a member of the Dutch parliament, launched a software technology start-up, and taught management of innovation at Eindhoven University of Technology.

Now retired, he is using his expertise in technological innovation, scientific and political policy, and economics to bring insightful historical and social context to the applications of general purpose technologies. He continues to research and publish scholarly articles on the nature of innovation as the basis for his Invention series.