Marconi, c.1930

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Marconi's Life

January 18, 1903. Guglielmo Marconi made history on Cape Cod (Truro, Massachusetts... at what is now Marconi Beach) by successfully transmitting messages between the President of the United States and the King of England.

Marconi was born on April 25, 1874 in Bologna, the second son of a runaway marriage between a wealthy Italian landowner, Giuseppe Marconi, and Annie Jameson of the Irish whiskey distillery family.

As a child, Marconi was a loner with manual dexterity and a penchant for inventing "scientific toys," for taking things apart and putting them together again. So, a geek of sorts.

He was energized by other wireless explorers, particularly Heinrich Hertz. He started with a few yards in his attic increasing to a few kilometers in his backyard. No scientist thought there was any commercial viability to this pursuit, but Marconi had a head for business too - and proved them all wrong.

Challenged by the barriers to communication -- distance, fixed cable, and line of sight -- Marconi became a wireless pioneer. The world became smaller and safer, more varied and open for every set of ears. We got radio.

A Memorial Plaque

The memorial plaque on the monument at the Marconi Station at Wellfleet in Cape Cod, MA.

Site of first American Transatlantic radio telegraph station built by Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America, predecessors of R.C.A. in 1902.

Through this station was transmitted on January 1903 the first American Transatlantic radiogram. It was addressed to Edward VII King of England by Theodore Roosevelt, President of the United States of America.