Marchese Guglielmo 1874-1937 Marconi

In Oct. 190o the erection of a long distance wireless telegraph station in Cornwall was commenced by Marconi and preliminary tests were carried out up to a distance of about 200 miles. On Dec. 12, 1901, Marconi, on his first attempt, succeeded in trans mitting and receiving signals across the Atlantic Ocean from Poldhu in Cornwall to St. John's, Newfoundland.

In 1902 Marconi, during a voyage on the American liner S.S. "Philadelphia," received messages up to a distance of 700 miles by day and 2,000 miles by night, thus first discovering the now well-known fact that wireless signals can usually be received over much greater distances at night than during the hours of daylight.

In

1902 he patented a magnetic detector, and in 1905 he took out his patents for the horizontal directional aerial. In 1910 Mar coni, assisted by Mr. H. J. Round, received signals and messages at Buenos Aires from Clif den (Ireland) over a distance of about 6,000 miles. In 1912 he introduced "the timed spark system" for generating continuous waves. This system was employed for several years at many important long distance stations and by its means Marconi sent the first messages ever transmitted by wire less from England to Australia on Sept. 22, 1918.

In 1916, during the World War, experiments were commenced by Marconi in Italy with very short waves, with the object of devising a directive, or beam system, of wireless telegraphy for war purposes. Later, in England, with the assistance of Mr. G. S.

Franklin, important results were obtained by the use of i5-metre waves between London and Birmingham. Short waves have proved themselves capable, even when used with a minimum of power, of carrying out communications by night as well as by day over any distance, even to the antipodes. They are much more amenable to control than long waves. (See WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY.) During the World War Marconi served in both the Italian army and navy. He also visited America as a member of the Italian war mission to the United States Government. In 1919 the King of Italy appointed him plenipotentiary delegate to the Peace Con ference in Paris, and in that capacity he attended the meetings of that conference and signed on behalf of Italy the peace treaties with Austria and Bulgaria. He also attended in the same capacity the meetings of the commission on mandates held in Paris and in London. Marconi was awarded the Nobel Prize for physics in 1909, the Albert Medal of the Royal Society of Arts, and, in the United States, the Franklin and the John Fritz Medals. In the same year he was nominated by the King of Italy to be a member of the Italian Senate. He died on July 20, 1937 at Rome.