Hedy's Folly

Resumen del libro

Pulitzer Prize winning author Richard Rhodes delivers one of the most bizarre (yet true) stories in the history of science: how a ravishing film star invented the technology that made cell phones, GPS systems, and many other devices possible.

What do movie star Hedy Lamarr, avant-garde composer George Antheil, and an Austrian arms merchant called Fritz Mandl have in common? The answer is spread spectrum radio: a revolutionary innovation based on the transmittal of communications signals over different frequencies. Beginning with an introduction at a Hollywood dinner table, Hedy's Folly tells a wild story of innovation that culminates in U.S. patent number 2,292,387, which was granted to Hedy Kiesler Markey (aka Hedy Lamarr) and Antheil in August 1942, for a "secret communication system." Narrated with the rigor and charisma we've come to expect of Rhodes, it is the remarkable story of spread spectrum radio's genesis and a riveting book about unlikely amateur inventors collaborating to change the world.

Richard Rhodes is the author or editor of twenty-three books, including four novels. His most recent work, The Twilight of the Bomb, is the last in a quartet about nuclear history; the first volume, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, won a Pulitzer Prize in Nonfiction, a National Book Award, and a National Book Critics Circle Award. He has received numerous fellowships, including grants from the Ford Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation Program in International Peace and Security. A visiting scholar at Harvard and MIT, and a host and correspondent for documentaries on public television's Frontline and American Experience series, he is also an affiliate of the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University.