Hedwig
Kiesler was a headstrong Austrian girl
with visions of becoming a Hollywood
star. She was so determined that she dropped out of school to star working at a
Berlin film
studio, and by 16 she was acting professionally. She eventually achieved
Hollywood stardom as Hedy Lamarr.
Lamarr had another, lesser known life, as an inventor. She, along with
avant-garde composer
George
Antheil, invented a technology that makes much of modern communication
possible. Richard
Rhodes focuses on this part of Lamarr’s life in Hedy’s Folly.
The woman known for her beauty was interested in technology
from youth. She enjoyed walking with her father, a banker, who explained how
things worked. Her first marriage
was to munitions manufacturer Fritz Mandl.
Though she was mostly a trophy to be shown off to his friends, she paid close
attention as he and the people he entertained discussed weapons and other technology.
When she moved to Hollywood, she sat up a little shop in her home and took up
inventing as a hobby.
When Lamarr learned of the sinking by U-boats that were intended to
carry children from Britain to safer
locations in Canada,
she put her head to the idea of improved torpedoes to combat the underwater
threat. The torpedo would be remote controlled. To avoid attempts to jam the
signal, the torpedo receiver and controller transmitter would can radio
frequencies rapidly in a synchronized manner.
She enlisted the assistance of Antheil, who had experience trying to
control and synchronize multiple player pianos, to work out a practical
implementation of the concept.
The idea was received well by the National
Inventors Council, apparently even receiving the endorsement of automotive engineer
Charles
Kettering. The Navy
did not think the idea was practical, but it did by the patent that was awarded
to the Hollywood pair in 1941. Eventually,
the frequency-hopping
technology invented by Lamarr was developed by the U.S. military for many
communication applications.
Spread
spectrum, a somewhat broader category of radio
communication of which frequency-hopping was the original type, was unveiled
from the military secrecy in 1976 with the
publication of a textbook on the subject by Robert C.
Dixon. The Federal
Communications Commission (FCC) moved fairly
quickly to make room in the radio spectrum for applications of spread spectrum.
These were mostly junk frequencies that had been set aside for
non-communication uses. Because it broadcast on multiple frequencies, spread
spectrum is less likely to be disrupted by interference by other transmissions,
like a microwave (Lamarr invented frequency hopping to avoid jamming). Another
important aspect of the FCC rule was that these frequencies could be used
without a license.
This technology is widely used today. Wi-fi, Bluetooth, GPS, and RFID
all use spread spectrum communication. It is the basis of the wireless
communication between computers that has shaped the way we live, work, and
behave in coffeehouses.
Lamarr and Antheil didn’t receive much recognition for their
groundbreaking invention until after it started making its way into American
households and pockets. In 1997, Lamarr (and
posthumously Antheil) received the Electronic
Frontier Foundation’s Pioneer Award when she was 82 years old. By then she
had retired to a very private life in Florida, where
she live until January 2000.
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