STORY OF THE BOY WHO INVENTED TELEVISION
Philo T. Farnsworth demonstrated two-dimensional television in his San Francisco, CA lab on September 7th, 1927 at age twenty-one, but he gave our world many things besides television. He contributed to the beginnings of space age science, and badly needed things such as the Isolette (first baby incubator), the first crude electron microscope, night vision technology, the first medical scope technology and not to mention improved microwave and fiber optic technology.
After the United States dropped two atomic (fission) bombs on Japan, scientists were busy devising a means to release in a less explosive manner, nuclear power for peaceful purposes. Fission process is at the heart of every nuclear reactor in use around the world today, but fission can be risky business because the fuels are radioactive, and the waste products are even more so.
Since the dawn of atomic theory, science has known that it might also be possible to release atomic energy by means of fusion, which is the same process that powers our sun and all the stars in our universe. Farnsworth’s highly secretive fusion project began at his house at the corner of State Street and St. Joe Boulevard here in Fort Wayne, IN before funding became available from ITT in 1959, and then he moved it to his laboratory on Pontiac Street, but it actually began much earlier according to a book titled, “Distant Vision” by Elma (Pem) G. Farnsworth. Pem said, “Even as Phil worked on other military projects, his ideas about electronic fusion were on the edge of his consciousness. His original thoughts were taking him into territory where few men-if any-were capable of comprehending”.
The original dimension of his thinking was manifest as early as 1937, in his Philadelphia lab, when he first witnessed a mysterious blue glow in his newly invented multipactor tube. The same phenomenon was later observed in his Maine laboratory in a Klystron-type tube that he invented for the military. A mysterious blue glow took residence in the structure-less center of his multipactor and klystron vacuum tubes and it persisted regardless of how high a vacuum he was able to maintain. After ruling out all possible explanations, he came to the conclusion that what he had created was a spherical plasma, or a “star in a jar,” that he later (1959) named poissor after the 18th century mathematician Simeon Poisson.
By 1944 Philo was satisfied he had the answer to this fusion mystery and his ideas gained solidarity early in 1947, when he engaged in a telephone conversation with Albert Einstein. On one of our trips to New York, we stopped for a visit with Frank and LuGuaria Reiber. Phil had been telling Frank about his ideas on controlled electronic fusion and inertial containment; Frank asked Phil, “Have you ever considered discussing this idea with Dr. Einstein?” Phil said, “No”, but he wanted to develop his math a little further before he did.” Frank without waiting disappeared into the bedroom, returning a few moments later to tell Phil, “I’ve got Einstein on the phone, and he’d be delighted to talk to you.”
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