If talking pictures could be said to have a father, it was Lee De Forest, a brilliant but erratic inventor of electrical devices of all types. {He had 216 patents.} In 1907, while searching for ways to boost telephone signals, De Forest invented something called the thermionic triode detector. De Forest's patent described it as "a System for Amplifying Feeble Electric Currents" and it would play a pivotal role in the development of broadcast radio and much else involving the delivery of sound, but the real developments would come from others. De Forest, unfortunately, was forever distracted by business problems. Several companies he founded went bankrupt, twice he was swindled by his backers, and constantly he was in court fighting over money or patents. For these reasons, he didn't follow through on his invention.
( Bill Bryson )
[ One Summer: America, 1927 ]
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