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If Radio Corporation of America
(RCA) was still in existence today, undoubtedly it would be running an advertisement
mentioning not just radio and television in their list of wireless communications
accomplishments, but also cellphones, satellite navigation (GPS), cable television,
and Wi-Fi. Founded in 1919, RCA was bought by General Electric in 1986 and then subsequently
broken into components and sold off to other companies like Sony, NBC (National
Broadcasting Company), and Comcast. This RCA advertisement heralding Marconi's
Morse code message "first forged in 1901 from the mere sound of three dots"
appeared in a 1952 issue of Radio & Television News magazine.
RCA Ad
 Three dots in Morse Code - sent from England
and received by Marconi in Newfoundland - proved that wireless signals could span
the Atlantic.
Three dots that opened a new era!
When Marconi, on December 12, 1901, heard a "3-dot" radio signal - the letter
"S" in Morse Code - across 1,800 miles of sea, it was an experimental triumph that
opened a new era in communications.
Before this historic event, wireless telegraphy had been limited primarily to
communications between the shore and ships at sea. Marconi's success, however, was
the forerunner of many other developments which led eventually to RCA world-wide
radiotelegraph service that now operates more than 80 direct circuits to 66 countries.
As radio progressed, its usefulness was expanded by invention and development
of the electron tube, the harnessing of short waves which made world-wide transmission
a reality, and the automatic transmission and reception of messages at high speed.
Radio, with its magic of spoken words and music broadcast over the world ...
television, the miracle of pictures in motion transmitted through the air ... these
mediums of modem communication have added notable links in the chain of electronic
advances first forged in 1901 from the mere sound of three dots.
See the latest wonders in radio, television, and electronics at RCA Exhibition
Hall, 36 West 49th St., N. Y. Admission is free. Radio Corporation of America, RCA
Building; Radio City, N.Y. 20, N.Y.
Today RCA Communications sends and receives about 81 million words each year
across the Atlantic; the messages are automatically recorded on tape, for error-free
transmission.
Posted July 19, 2022
(updated from original post on 12/27/2015)
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