Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1922-03-31
VICTORY OF INVENTOR
Years Of Hard Labor Crowned at
b.: Last with Success.
DISCOVERY OF The RADIO CIRCUIT

Edwin n. Armstrong Stumbled on
as a Boy and After Long Fight il
the Courts Established His Right
TO the Protection of Patents.
Sequences that belong to the drami
rather than to the drab routine o
processes in court ran to swift clima'
in the last week writes New Yori
correspondent when the decision o
the United States. Court of Appeal'
established as finality the claims o
Edwin H. Armstrong as the inventor
of the radio circuit, whose application
in broadcasting wireless deliveries II
now stirring public wonder.
= The play had an humble beginning
ten years ago when Armstrong, ther
a student in a crude and improvisec
laboratory in his home. worked out
feedback circuit contrivance which III
recognized as a discovery Of the frs
importance. Unable to get help from
his father toward procuring patent
he consulted an uncle, who, while ne
did not help him toward that imme.
diate objective, gave him the sage ad-
vice to make known what he had found
to persons he could trust and who
could understand 1t, and to make
documentary declaration under no.
tary's seal. Young Armstrong drew
plans clearly setting forth the discov-
cry and supplemented them with ex-
planatory text that was equally lucid
Thus fortified he went on with the
studies that were to prepare him foI
a career, confident that his own re-
sources would finally enable him to
obtain the desired patents.
Among those with whom he shared
his early confidence was Prof. Michael
I. Pupin, director of the Marcellus
Hartley Research Laboratory OF Col
umbia University, with whom he was
studying. and who placed at his SER
vice the facilities of the Hartley lab
oratory in which to perfect his inven-
ton. ....' ...
Indisereetly Frank.
The second act Of the play present
ed the young man as perhaps more
enthusiastic than discreet, for he talk
ed of his work freely and without re-
serve in mixed company. His career
enabled him in few years to file ap-
plication for patent. Then, suddenly
a disputant stepped into his path IN
the person of Lee De Forest already
famous as an inventor in this field
who had adopted and was utilizing
some of the principles which Arm
strong had asserted as his own and
who resisted interference with such
use on the ground Of his own priority
The drama unfoided for its final
rrtting with a suit in the Federal Dis
trict Court before Judge Julius M.
Mayer, with Armstrong plaintif and
De Forest defendant; decision for
Armstrong; and an appeal, which has
resulted in the affirmation of Judge
Mayors findings, and constructively
in much else, as claimed by Arm
strong's attorney, namely:
No ns-Atlantic telephone conver-
sation can be carried on without use
of the Armstrong principle; none of
the big radiophone broadcasting sta
tions now sending music nightly
through the air can operate except
under the Armstrong patent; even the
modern multiplex form Of wire teleg-
raphy and telephony must pay tribute
to Armstrong.
n.. "Most Important"
Prof. Pupin, speaking of the deci-
sion of the Circuit Court of Appeals
said:
This decision refers to one of the
most important. If not the most I'M
portant. inventions in the wireless art
It is the invention of employing in
connection with an audion a coupling
which enables a local battery to con-
tribute it's energy to the amplification
Of a signal received in a wireless sta =
ton. The contribution obtained In
this manner from the local battery or
the local source Of energy may be
made as large as we please within
certain definite limits. Armstrong
was the first to employ this coupling
or as it is called, the Armstrong Feed
back Circuit and he did it while he
was still an undergraduate at Column
bia University.
The Next Step.
THE invention enabled him to make
another most important step in wire
less telegraphy, and that is the con-