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 Guglielmo Marconi: 100th Anniversary of Radio Scott 978 (1995) Each year, International Marconi Day is celebrated on the Saturday closest to the birthdate of the inventor of the wireless radio, Guglielmo Marconi. He was born in Bologna on April 25, 1874, so for 2026, the celebration coincides with the anniversary of his birth. The stamp above, issued in 1995, commemorates the 100th anniversary of the invention of the radio. Among his many experiments, in 1895, the young Marconi, only 21 years old at the time, invented the first radio to broadcast signals beyond the line-of-sight. The breakthrough in this technology came with the development of antennae capable of capturing the radio signals.  Marconi's First Radio Transmitter From Wikimedia Commons, in the Public Domain He went to England one year later and obtained his first patent for the “wireless telegraph”. There, he founded the “Wireless Telegraph and Signal Company,” which later became the Marconi Company. He opened a branch in the United States, which was later sold to General Electric and became Radio Corporation of America, or RCA. In 1909, Marconi was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, along with the German scientist Karl Ferdinand Braun, for their "contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy" (radio communications). In his life, Marconi held 70 patents, but the invention of the wireless radio stands out as his crowning achievement. The technology proved its importance during the sinking of the Titanic, which took place on the vessel's maiden voyage on April 15, 1912. The “mayday” radio signals sent out by the ship’s wireless radio operator, or “marconist” (who continued to send out alerts and went down with the ship) are credited with saving over 700 people who had abandoned ship and were picked up by vessels who received the distress signals. Shortly thereafter, radios became mandatory on all ships. Another of Marconi’s inventions was that of the “big cell phone” or “big mobile phone” that connected Pope Pius XI’s car with the Vatican and the papal summer residence at Castel Gandolfo. Apple founder Steve Jobs paid tribute to Marconi by saying "Marconi is our roots. We are the branches." And Sir Martin Cooper, who is credited with inventing the hand-held mobile phone as we know it today, said, "Actually, my invention, the small mobile phone, descends from Marconi's intuition and from Marconi's big cell phone."  Memorial plaque to Guglielmo Marconi The Basilica di Santa Croce, Florence, Italy Photo by Ввласенко From Wikimedia Commons, used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license On July 20, 1937, Guglielmo Marconi died of a heart attack in Rome. In tribute, radios around the world fell silent as stations simultaneously interrupted their broadcasts for two minutes. Marconi is buried at the Mausoleum of Guglielmo Marconi in Sasso Marconi, Emilia-Romagna (which assumed that name in his honor in 1938). The plaque shown above remembers Marconi at the Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence, and commemorates the centennial of the invention of the radio. The plaque is located in close proximity to the tombs of Galileo and Michelangelo in the Basilica. Marconi appears on two additional stamps issued by Vatican City. He is pictured, with Pope Pius XI, on one of the stamps commemorating the 50th anniversary of Vatican Radio in 1981. And, the 150th anniversary of the birth of Marconi is celebrated on a stamp from 2024, which was jointly issued with the Sovereign Military Order of Malta. 
 Guglielmo Marconi: Left, 50th Anniversary of Vatican Radio (Scott 681, 1981) Right, 150th Anniversary of Birth (Scott 1856, 2024) By clicking on the Vatican News reference below, the reader can access a short YouTube video on Marconi, which provides a nice review of his works and his life. REFERENCES: |
