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Inventor: John Logie Baird
Most
Famous Invention: Television
Biography:
John Logie Baird was born
August 1888 in Helensburgh, Dunbartonshire, Scotland. He graduated from
Larchfield Academy in Helensburgh, the Glasgow and West of Scotland
Technical College in Strathclyde and attended the University of
Glasgow. He left the university to enlist in the British service in
World War I and never bothered to return to pursue his degree.
Baird experimented with the idea of
television, successfully transmitting the first television pictures with
what is called a greyscale image on October 2, 1925.
Baird gave the first public demonstration
of television on January 26, 1926 It is interesting to note that some
six months later Baird also gave demonstrations broadcasting
colour images, therefore becoming not just the inventor of television
but the first to broadcast television in colour also. Baird was
also the first to broadcast a long distance television demonstration.
John Logie Baird
In 1932, Baird made broadcasts
demonstrating the use of ultra short waves, what we now refer to as the
VHF band.
It is very evident that Baird not only
invented television but that he constantly improved on it and made
amazing changes, some of them being changes that later became part of
the television world that became accessible for use by the public.
Baird was not only a talented inventor,
quite possibly a genius, but also a great showman, rivaling P. T. Barnum
in that ability. He broadcast events that people wanted to see, thereby
luring them not only by his wondrous invention but also by the desire to
see the event being broadcast. He broadcast boxing matches and also
regular television programs from his own studio.
It is amazing to realize that Baird built
the first working television set from an old hatbox, shears, darning
needles, bicycle light lenses, a tea chest, sealing wax and some glue.
When he succeeded in burning his hand badly
by accidentally getting an electric shock while working on his
invention, Baird’s landlord asked him to move from his workshop before
he managed to kill himself or someone else or to burn the place down.
After that Baird worked from his home.
Baird died on June 14, 1946, after a life of tremendous successes.
John Logie Baird demonstrating his "televisor" circa 1925
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