Forgive me for making one last post after my official "last comment and I'll
shut up" post from last night...
I have some down time from work this morning, and did a little checking on the
Fessenden history (I have an interest in early radio history, as you can well
imagine by now). In summary, while there is some doubt raised about the
Christmas Eve first broadcast (from a respected communications historian, Donna
Halper, for one), there is also no conclusive proof that the first broadcast
DIDN'T take place as claimed.
So why wasn't there more about it in the press at the time? Because it appears
that it was an afterthought... Fessenden's experiments were for point-to-point
voice communications; broadcasting (a term in use at the time) to the public,
or even a wide audience was never his intention at the time. It was probably
not until many years later that he realized what he did.
Also, with all due respect to N6IE and the author of the RadioWorld article he
cites, it appears that a letter written "five months before his death in 1932"
was not the first citation of the first broadcast. I found references to a
1928 speech that brought the matter up. (And if I could find that within 5
minutes of a quick Google search, why couldn't the RW article author?)
Suffice to say, we may never "know" for sure. But until proof to the contrary
surfaces, I think we can accept this one, even with a grain of salt.
73, ron w3wn
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