Presidential Library’s collections spotlight Alexander Popov, the inventor of radio

The 160th anniversary of the birth of the talented Russian engineer, inventor of radio, Alexander Popov (1859-1906) will be marked on March 16, 2019. Apart from rare publications about the scientific quest and the life of the scientist, the Presidential Library's collections also include “The memorial plaque on the building of the Kronstadt Marine Plant, dedicated to the first Radio Technical Enterprise in Russia, which was the initiative of A. S. Popov (Saint Petersburg, Kronstadt)” (2014). 

... Alexander's father, parish priest in a village church in Turinskiye Rudniki (Perm Governorate) encouraged his son’s early passion for invention. As a result a ten-year-old boy made a galvanic battery from bottles with a broken neck - a handmade electric bell, which was the pride of the whole Popov family. Nonetheless, Alexander remained illiterate up to the age of 11. He showed interest in technical wonders and was indifferent to dull unclear signs, called letters. It was out of necessity that just in a month and a half he learned to read and write.

There were seven children in the Popov family, and there was no money to pay for gymnasium education. Following family tradition, Alexander entered the theological school, and then studied in the seminary school. In addition to the Holy Scripture and theology, he studied Russian language and literature, Latin, Greek, French and German, mathematics, history, logic, psychology, philosophy and had a rather extensive course in physics.

Knowledge that Alexander gained in the seminary school was enough to successfully pass entrance exams and enter St. Petersburg University, Physics and Mathematics Faculty, in 1877. By that time he chose the area of ​​knowledge that interested him most. It was a little-studied phenomenon of electricity.

Having invented the world's first radio receiver, Alexander Popov constructed a reliable simple radio apparatus, which immediately found practical application. In a very determined way he began to equip ships of the Russian Navy with radio stations, designed the equipment, tested and improved it, and instructed officers and radio operators.

On May 7, 1895 Popov appeared before the St. Petersburg Physicochemical Society and announced his discovery. In history, this day is known as the date of radio invention. However, this discovery passed almost unnoticed: the marine department intended to use Popov's know-how for military purposes, the experimental work was classified.

In the meantime, sensational publications about the invention of the wireless telegraph by an Italian inventor Marconi came out in Europe. On September 2, 1896, he transmitted a radiogram over a distance of three kilometers. Industrialists and representatives of military forces began to invest huge sums of money in the development of the new means of communication.

There are documents, which read about the attempts of Marconi and the British company he headed to conceal the fact that he took all the credit of invention of the radio transmitter and even the radio itself. Nonetheless the book “The Invention of Wireless Telegraph” authored by V. K. Lebedinsky from the Presidential Library’s collections features the views of Alexander Popov’s foreign colleagues on the issue of the priority of invention.

After the invention of radio communication by Alexander Popov, the scientist from St. Petersburg was invited to America to set up the production of radio stations. He was offered unbelievably good money. Popov’s reply, which was published in Professor V. K. Lebedinsky’s book “The Invention of Wireless Telegraph” (1925), whose electronic copy is available in the Electronic Reading Room of the Presidential Library, astonished employers who were used to measuring everything in terms of money: “I am Russian and I have the right to share all my knowledge, all my work, all my achievements only with my homeland. And if not contemporaries, then maybe our descendants will see how great my devotion to our homeland is and how happy I am that the new means of communication is discovered in Russia, not abroad."