FOUNDING THE BASIS FOR WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY (PMM 377).

HERTZ, HEINRICH.

Untersuchungen ueber die Ausbreitung der elektrischen Kraft. Mit 40 Figuren im Text.

Leipzig, Johann Ambrosius Barth, 1892. 8vo. Contemporary half cloth. VI, (2), 295, (1) pp. Upper part of joints neatly repaired,otherwise a clean and fresh copy.

First edition of Hertz' seminal book on electromagnetic waves, which laid the foundation of radiotelegraphy and radiotelephony.

While investigating Maxwell's conception of light as an electromagnetic phenomenon, Hertz exposed that waves of electricity could both be transmitted and received through space. This had profound consequences and led, amongst other things, to Marconi's perfection of wireless telegraphy.

"His [Hertz'] discovery of the properties of reflection, refraction, and polarization in electricity, with this wave theory of electrical motion, laid the foundation of radiotelegraphy and radiotelephony." (Milestones of Science, p 47.)

"Experimental proof by Hertz of the Faraday-Maxwell hypothesis that electrical waves can be projected through space was begun in 1887, eight years after Maxwell's death. The two main requirements were (a) a method of producing the waves, supposing that they existed, and (b) a method of detecting them once they were produced." (PMM, 377.)
"Hertz's researches on electrical waves vindicated the Helmholtz ideal of the physicist as one whose competences embraced both experiment and mathematics. Hertz entered physics at the right time for one of his abilities to make a critical contribution; because the outstanding problem of physics was the disorderly condition of electrodynamics, what was needed was someone with the theoretical power to analyze the competing theories and with the experimental judgment to produce the evidence that would persuade the physical community that a decision between the theories had been reached." (DSB, VI, 348b.)

"In the early 1890's the young inventor Guglielmo Marconi read of Hertz's electric wave experiments in an Italian electrical journal and began considering the Possibility of communication by wireless waves. Hertz's work initiated a technological development as momentous as it physical counterpart." (DSB, VI, 349a.).

Honeyman, No. 1668 - PMM 377 - Sparrow, Milestones of Science Nr. 101

Order-nr.: 42874