The Irish standard., 1902-03-29
MARCONI'S MESSAGES.
How the Inventor of wireless Teles.
raphy Got His Idea and Per-
fected the System.

By the time he was 16, Guglielmo
Marconi had modelled various instru.
ments which were undoubted evidences
OF his latent genius. They showed an
insight into mechanical problems far
beyond his years, and were of sufficient
promise to be worthy of the encour-
agement Of his friends. 1t was not I'M
! til he was go, however, that his great
life began directing it's energies toward
the problems of wireless telegraphy.
At that age he became interested in
the work of Prof. Heinrich Hertz, a
German scientist, who, in attempting
to discover the nature of electricity,
accidentally produced electric, or cleo
tromagnetic waves, and detected their
presence in the ether by means of a
wire hoop so broken that the electric
ity spanked across the gap. No one, not
even Hertz himself, realized the tre-
mendous Importance of his discovery,
says Herbert Wallace, in Success.
Men like Prof. Lodge, Lord Kelvin, Sir
William Preece, Popoff, and others
prominent in electrical science, talked
about Hertz work, and some of them
reproduced his experiments, but it re-
NAMED for this young Italian dream
er to jump across the gap of years Of
scientific study and make practical the
most important coil. When one re.
members that the induction coil made
possible the dynamo, electric lights,
the telegraph, and the telephone, the
significance of the comparison is ap.
parent. Hertz discovery was the be-
ginning of wireless telegraphy. No
one knows that better than Marconi
himself. He does not wish the credit
OF originality in this matter, but he de-
serves all the credit and praise tho
world can bestow upon one who has
made theory practical by conquer
ing unexpected difficulties by unremit-
ting perseverance.
Marconi read Of the work of Hertz
early in 1894, when he was barely 20
years of age. How the thought came
to him that there was a principle
which could be applied to communities
ton over great distances, no one will
know. Looking back on it, in the light
of what he has done, the thought
seems most natural-even absurdly
simple. Hertz detected spark in
broken hoop, few feet away from
the flash of an induction coil. Why
didn't he get n better detector than
broken hoop, and better transmitter
than small induction coil, and send
out the flashes in such manner that
the detector would record message?
Why, indeed? Perhaps, if Hertz had
lived, he might have thought of the
possibilities of his discovery; but in
the few months of his life which fol-
lowed his greatest experiment, the inn
portant thought did not come to him.
Herein, it seems to me, lies the dis
tinction-that small differentiation
which is Observation-Disclosures q
great man and a genius. The former,
by long struggle, almost gains the
height; the latter leaps to it, by the
aid of the spark, divine or superhu-
man, which his brain possesses. Why
didn't Prof Lodge, or Lord Kelvin. or
Sir William Preece. or any one of a
hundred of the other great scientists
of the time think of utilizing Hertz
discovery? Marconi. himself. when
the thought occurred to him, believed
that the idea must have come or would
soon come to one of these. To him
they were unnamable: he was not ac-
quainted with the scientists. He was
not an electrician himself. He held no
academic or scientific degree which
testified to his having satisfactorily
completed any college course. 1t
seemed presunptuous to try.
He waited almost Il year, all the time
turning the matter over in his mind
all the time wtchng for the am
nouncement of a system of wireless
telegraphy by Hertzian waves-but
none came. The young man became
impatient: and. moro because of the
genius burning within him for out
ward expression. perhaps, than that
lie might outstrip others. he began to
experiment. This was in December,
1894.