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Lee Deforest

Male 1873 - 1961  (87 years)    Has more than 100 ancestors but no descendants in this family tree.

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  • Name Lee Deforest 
    Birth 26 Aug 1873 
    Gender Male 
    Death 30 Jun 1961 
    Person ID I303023  Geneagraphie
    Last Modified 6 Feb 2003 

    Father Henry Swift Deforest,   b. 1833   d. 1896 (Age 63 years) 
    Mother Anna Margaret Robbins   d. Yes, date unknown 
    Family ID F121550  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Dore Stanton Blatch   d. Yes, date unknown 
    Family ID F128800  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 30 Oct 2001 

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  • Notes 
    • Inventor with over 300 patents in electronic communications, pioneer in radio broadcasting, and exhibitor of sound motion pictures in 1923.

      http://www.invent.org/book/book-text/30.html
      http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aso/databank/entries/btfore.html

      Born at Council Bluffs, Iowa, de Forest at an early age exhibited the inventive talents that were to make him famous. His father sent him to the Mt. Hermon (Massachusetts) School for Boys and from there he entered Yale University. While in college, he continued to invent-an improved typebar movement for his typewriter, an improved compass joint, a 'puzzle game'-all to help defray his expenses. After receiving his B.S., he continued his studies at Yale and received his Ph.D. in 1899. De Forest's doctorate thesis was on the "Reflection of Hertzian Waves from the Ends of Parallel Wires"; thus began his long career in radio.
      DeForest found a clue to creating the long-sought detector of electromagnetic radiation in John A. Fleming's invention of the so-called electronic valve. The most serious drawback of the Fleming valve was that it was relatively insensitive to changes in the intensity of incident electromagnetic radiation. Moreover, the Fleming valve could act only as a rectifier, not an amplifier.
      DeForest's simple but revolutionary answer was to insert a third electrode between the cathode and the anode. The audion amplifier was the most important of de Forest's more than 300 patents.



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