num_pages: 244
description: Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Rhodes delivers a remarkable story of science how a ravishing film star and an avant-garde composer invented spread-spectrum radio the technology that made wireless phones GPS systems and many other devices possible. Beginning at a Hollywood dinner table Hedy's Folly tells a wild story of innovation that culminates in U.S. patent number 2292387 for a secret communication system. Along the way Rhodes weaves together Hollywoods golden era the history of Vienna 1920s Paris weapons design music a tutorial on patent law and a brief treatise on transmission technology. Narrated with the rigor and charisma we've come to expect of Rhodes it is a remarkable narrative adventure about spread-spectrum radio's genesis and unlikely amateur inventors collaborating to change the world.
language: English
title: Hedy's Folly: The Life and Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World
publisher: None