On 12 December 1901 Guglielmo Marconi reported receiving the Morse letter S, sent from his station at Poldhu in Cornwall, at Signal Hill in St John's, Newfoundland, some 3,500 kilometers away. Some engineers have questioned whether the faint clicks were truly the signal, but the demonstration convinced the world that radio could span oceans.
Facts
Milestone Year WhenMarconi's receiving aerial at Signal Hill was a wire raised by a kite, the method used after storms wrecked the balloon-borne antenna originally planned. 2 LocationSignal Hill, St John's, Newfoundland 1 Connections
Credited To
Source Nobel Prize Official Site
In Medium
Open Questions
Sources
1. Encyclopedia Britannica
2. Wikipedia
Wikimedia FoundationWikipedia: Guglielmo Marconi, transatlantic signal sectionQuote, Wikipedia: Guglielmo Marconi, transatlantic signal section
On December 12th 1901, using an antenna suspended from a kite, he reported hearing the Morse code letter "S" transmitted repeatedly from Poldhu, over a distance of about 2,200 miles (3,500 km).
Nobel Prize Official Site
Open Questions (1 open question)
Was the signal Marconi reported receiving in December 1901 genuinely a transatlantic radio transmission?
No automatic instrument record was made at Signal Hill; Marconi and his assistant listened for the expected repeated Morse letter S through a telephone receiver alone, and technical historians have since questioned the reception given uncertainty about the wavelength used and the difficulty of long-distance daytime propagation at the likely frequencies.
What would resolve this An independent contemporary instrumented record, which does not exist and cannot now be produced; Marconi's more systematic 1902 shipboard tests supply indirect support but do not themselves confirm the 1901 reception.
History of radio technologyWikipedia
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