Edwin ArmstrongDied 1 Feb 1954 at age 63 (born 18 Dec 1890). Edwin Howard Armstrong was an American electrical engineer and inventor who laid the foundation for much of modern radio and electronic circuitry. Fascinated by radio from childhood, he built a 125-foot-tall antenna in the front yard in 1910 and invented the continuous-wave transmitter (1912), the regenerative circuit (1912), superheterodyne circuits (1918), and frequency modulation for the FM radio system (1933). His inventions and developments form the backbone of radio communications as we know it. Exhausted by nonstop patent battles from the 1920s on, he took his own life. Nevertheless, he won most of the suits posthumously.[His date of death is either (EB 31 Jan 1954 or (DSB 1 Feb 1954 because his suicide occurred at some unknown time during the night between those dates.] |
