|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
In many ways, Sarnoff is the father both of radio and television. Though not an inventor or a technologist himself, Sarnoff had the gift of seeing profitable ways to capitalize on new technologies.
As an employee of American Marconi, Sarnoff was exposed to the technology of radio. At the time, radio technology was used almost exclusively in the shipping industry. In a memo written to his supervisor in 1915, Sarnoff outlined his plan to turn radio into an entertainment medium, making "radio a household utility in the same sense as the piano or phonograph."
While the memo was ignored, Sarnoff did not abandon his idea. In what would become a defining moment in the history of radio, Sarnoff got the rights to broadcast the 1921 fight between Jack Dempsey and Georges Carpentier. As thousands gathered around the few existing radios to listen, a new medium had been launched. Going under the trade name Radiola, sales in 1924 skyrocketed to over $80 million.
Sarnoff's next step of genius was to bring single broadcasts to a national audience through networking radio stations across the country. To do so, he created a subsidiary called the National Broadcasting Company, a company known to this day simply as NBC.
Sarnoff's vision did not stop with the radio. After seeing a prototype for a television in 1923, he would set up a special subsidiary of NBC to experiment with this even more fascinating medium. By 1941, NBC had begun the first commercial broadcasts in this medium.
|
|
|
|
|
|
