View source for Guglielmo Marconi

{{Short description|Italian electrical engineer and inventor (1874–1937)}}
{{Redirect|Marconi}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name             = Guglielmo Marconi
| honorific_suffix = {{Post-nominals|country=GBR|GCVO|size=100%}}
| image            = Guglielmo Marconi.jpg
| caption          = Marconi in 1908
| title            = Member of the [[Senate of the Kingdom of Italy|Senate of the Kingdom]]
| term_start       = 1914
| term_end         = 1937
| appointer        = [[Victor Emmanuel III]]
| birth_name       = Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi
| birth_date       = {{Birth date|1874|04|25|df=yes}}
| birth_place      = [[Bologna]], [[Emilia-Romagna]], [[Kingdom of Italy]]
| death_date       = {{Death date and age|1937|07|20|1874|04|25|df=yes}}
| death_place      = [[Rome]], Kingdom of Italy
{{Infobox person
| embed            = yes
| burial_place     = [[Mausoleum of Guglielmo Marconi]], Emilia-Romagna
| monuments        = [[Guglielmo Marconi Memorial]], [[Washington, D.C.]], US
| known_for        = {{Collapsible list|bullets=yes|title={{Nobold|[[Invention of radio]]}}
 | Inventing the <br/> [[monopole antenna]] (1895)
 | Inventing the <br/> [[magnetic detector]] (1902)
 }}
| party            = [[National Fascist Party|PNF]] (1923–1937)
| spouses          = {{Plain list|
* {{Marriage|Beatrice O'Brien|1905|1924|reason=divorced}}
* {{Marriage|Maria Bezzi-Scali|1927}}
}}
| children         = 5 (4 with Beatrice, 1 with Maria)
| family           = {{Plain list|
* [[Jameson Irish Whiskey#John Jameson and his family|Jameson]] (by birth)
* [[O'Brien dynasty|O'Brien]] (by marriage)
}}
| awards           = {{Plain list|
* [[Matteucci Medal]] (1901)
* [[Nobel Prize in Physics]] (1909)
* [[Albert Medal (Royal Society of Arts)|Albert Medal]] (1914)
* [[Franklin Medal]] (1918)
* [[John Scott Medal]] (1931)
* [[Wilhelm Exner Medal]] (1934)
}}
| module           = {{Infobox engineering career
| discipline       = [[Electrical engineering]]
| sub_discipline   = [[Radio-frequency engineering]]
| years_active     = 1894–1937
| employer         = [[Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company]] (founder)
| significant_awards = {{Plain list|
* [[IRE Medal of Honor]] (1920)
* [[John Fritz Medal]] (1923)
* [[Kelvin Gold Medal]] (1932)
}}
}}
{{Infobox academic
| embed            = yes
| influences       = [[Augusto Righi]]
}}
| signature        = Guglielmo Marconi Signature.svg
}}
}}

'''Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquess of Marconi''' ({{IPAc-en|m|ɑːr|ˈ|k|oʊ|n|i}} {{Respell|mar|KOH|nee}};<ref>{{Cite web|title=MARCONI Definition & Meaning|url=https://www.dictionary.com/browse/marconi|website=[[dictionary.com]]|access-date=25 May 2025}}</ref> {{IPA|it|ɡuʎˈʎɛlmo marˈkoːni|lang}}; 25 April 1874 – 20 July 1937) was an Italian<ref>{{Cite web|date=2023-04-21|title=Guglielmo Marconi &#124; Italian physicist|website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Guglielmo-Marconi}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|date=2017-04-28|title=This week in tech|newspaper=The Daily Telegraph|location=London|url-access=subscription|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/connecting-britain/guglielmo-marconi-birth/|url-status=live|archive-date=2022-01-11|archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220111/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/connecting-britain/guglielmo-marconi-birth/}}{{cbignore}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|date=2023-03-27|title=Guglielmo Marconi|website=[[History (American TV network)|History]]|url=http://www.history.com/topics/inventions/guglielmo-marconi}}</ref><ref>[[Gavin Weightman]], ''The Industrial Revolutionaries: The Making of the Modern World 1776–1914'', Grove/Atlantic, Inc. 2010. p. 357.</ref> [[electrical engineer]], inventor, and politician known for his creation of a practical [[radio wave]]-based [[Wireless telegraphy|wireless telegraph]] system.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Bondyopadhyay |first1=Prebir K. |title=25th European Microwave Conference, 1995 |year=1995 |page=879 |chapter=Guglielmo Marconi – The father of long-distance radio communication –  An engineer's tribute |doi=10.1109/EUMA.1995.337090 |s2cid=6928472}}</ref> This led to Marconi being largely credited as the inventor of [[radio]]<ref>[[#Hong|Hong]], p. 1</ref> and sharing the 1909 [[Nobel Prize in Physics]] with [[Karl Ferdinand Braun]] "in recognition of their contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy".<ref name=NPbio>{{cite web|url=http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1909/marconi-bio.html|title=Guglielmo Marconi: The Nobel Prize in Physics|year=1909|website=nobelprize.org}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1109/5.658778|title=Sir J.C. Bose diode detector received Marconi's first transatlantic wireless signal of December 1901 (the 'Italian Navy Coherer' Scandal Revisited)|year=1998|last1=Bondyopadhyay|first1=P. K.|journal=Proceedings of the IEEE|volume=86|page=259|url=https://zenodo.org/record/1232181}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|first=Amit|last=Roy|url=http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081208/jsp/nation/story_10221833.jsp|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090123050302/http://www.telegraphindia.com/1081208/jsp/nation/story_10221833.jsp|url-status=dead|archive-date=23 January 2009|work=The Telegraph|location=[[Kolkota]]|title=Cambridge 'pioneer' honour for Bose|date=8 December 2008|access-date=10 June 2010}}</ref>
His work laid the foundation for the development of radio, [[television]], and all modern [[wireless]] communication systems.<ref>{{cite web |title=Marconi forged today's interconnected world of communication |url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23130862-900-marconi-forged-todays-interconnected-world-of-communication/ |website=New Scientist |publisher=New Scientist Ltd |access-date=2024-06-28}}</ref>

Marconi was also an entrepreneur and businessman who founded the Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company (which became the [[Marconi Company]]) in the [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|United Kingdom]] in 1897. In 1929, Marconi was ennobled as a [[marchese|marquess]] ({{langx|it|marchese}}) by [[Victor Emmanuel III]]. In 1931, he set up [[Vatican Radio]] for [[Pope Pius XI]].

{{TOC limit|4}}

==Biography==
===Early years===
Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QA0oAQAAIAAJ|title=Atti della Accademia di scienze, lettere e arti di Palermo: Scienze|publisher=Presso l'accademia|year=1974|page=11|issn=0365-6322|oclc=4272244}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{cite web|url=https://antenati.cultura.gov.it/ark:/12657/an_ua35877952/Lynox99|title=Marconi Birth Certificate}}</ref> was born in [[Palazzo Dall'Armi Marescalchi, Bologna|Palazzo Marescalchi]] in [[Bologna]] on 25 April 1874, the second son of Giuseppe Marconi (an Italian aristocratic landowner from [[Porretta Terme]] who lived in the countryside of [[Sasso Marconi|Pontecchio]]) and his Irish wife Annie Jameson (daughter of Andrew Jameson of Daphne Castle in [[County Wexford]], a land agent, and wife Margaret, daughter of James Cochrane of Glen Lodge, [[Sligo]], and sister of Scottish naturalist [[James Sligo Jameson]], and granddaughter of John Jameson of [[Dublin]], the Scottish founder of [[Jameson Irish Whiskey]]).<ref>{{cite book|last=Sexton|first=Michael|year=2005|title=Marconi: the Irish connection|publisher=Four Courts Press|isbn=9781851828418}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Raboy|first=Marc|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RqVHDAAAQBAJ&q=marconi+Marescalchi&pg=PA19|title=Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World|page=19|place=New York|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2016|isbn=9780199313587|via=Google Books}}</ref> His father, who was a widower with a son, Luigi, married Jameson on 16 April 1864 in [[Boulogne-sur-Mer]], France. Alfonso, Marconi's older brother, was born in 1865. Between the ages of two and six, Marconi and Alfonso lived with their mother in the English town of [[Bedford]]. Having an Irish mother helped explain Marconi's many activities in [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|Great Britain and Ireland]]. When Guglielmo was three years old, on 4 May 1877, Giuseppe Marconi decided to obtain British citizenship. Marconi could have thus also opted for British citizenship anytime, as both his parents had British citizenship.<ref>{{cite web |title=Guglielmo Marconi |url=https://www.biography.com/inventors/guglielmo-marconi |website=Biography |date=22 January 2021 |publisher=A&E Television Networks}}</ref>

===Education===
Marconi did not attend school as a child and did not go on to formal higher education.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|editor-first=Robert|editor-last=McHenry|editor-link=Robert McHenry|encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica|title=Guglielmo Marconi|year=1993}}</ref><ref name="marconisociety.org">{{Cite web|url=http://marconisociety.org/marconi-biography/|title=The Marconi Society, book synopsis – Marc Raboy, The Discovery that Continues to Change the World|access-date=13 September 2018|archive-date=3 October 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191003014822/http://marconisociety.org/marconi-biography/|url-status=dead }}</ref><ref name="Dunlap, Orrin Elmer 1937, page 10">{{cite book|isbn=9780343022693|last=Dunlap|first=Orrin Elmer|title=Marconi, the man and his wireless|publisher=Macmillan|year=1937|page=10}}</ref> Instead, he learned chemistry, mathematics, and physics at home from a series of private tutors hired by his parents. His family hired additional tutors for Marconi in the winter when they would leave Bologna for the warmer climate of [[Tuscany]] or [[Florence]].<ref name="Dunlap, Orrin Elmer 1937, page 10"/> Marconi noted an important mentor was professor Vincenzo Rosa, a high school physics teacher in [[Livorno]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.fgm.it/en/marconi-en/profiles/vincenzo-rosa.html|title=Vincenzo Rosa|website=fgm.it}}</ref><ref name="marconisociety.org"/> Rosa taught the 17-year-old Marconi the basics of physical phenomena as well as new theories on electricity. At the age of 18 and back in Bologna, Marconi became acquainted with [[University of Bologna]] physicist [[Augusto Righi]], who had done research on [[Heinrich Hertz]]'s work. Righi permitted Marconi to attend lectures at the university and also to use the university's laboratory and library.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.scienzagiovane.unibo.it/English/scientists/marconi-1.html|title=Guglielmo Marconi|first1=Fabrizio|last1=Bònoli|first2=Giorgio|last2=Dragoni|website=Scienzagiovane.unibo.it|access-date=10 June 2016}}</ref><ref name = Sakalis>{{Cite news|url=https://www.italymagazine.com/featured-story/bologna-celebrates-150-years-guglielmo-marconi-and-his-global-legacy|title=
Bologna Celebrates 150 Years of Guglielmo Marconi and His Global Legacy|last=Sakalis|first=Alex|date=18 April 2024|work=Italy Magazine|access-date=25 March 2025}}</ref>

===Radio work===
From youth, Marconi was interested in science and electricity. In the early 1890s, he began working on the idea of "[[wireless telegraphy]]" – i.e., the transmission of telegraph messages without connecting wires as used by the [[electric telegraph]]. This was not a new idea; numerous investigators and inventors had been exploring wireless telegraph technologies and even building systems using electric [[Electrical resistivity and conductivity|conduction]], [[electromagnetic induction]] and optical (light) signalling for over 50 years, but none had proved technically and commercially successful. A relatively new development came from [[Heinrich Hertz]], who, in 1888, demonstrated that one could produce and detect [[electromagnetic radiation]], based on the work of [[James Clerk Maxwell]]. At the time, this radiation was commonly called "Hertzian" waves, and is now generally referred to as [[radio waves]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://earlyradiohistory.us/sec022.htm|title=22. Word Origins|work=earlyradiohistory.us}}</ref>

There was a great deal of interest in radio waves in the physics community, but this interest was in the scientific phenomenon, not in its potential as a communication method. Physicists generally looked on radio waves as an invisible form of light that could only travel along a [[Line-of-sight propagation|line of sight]] path, limiting its range to the visual horizon like existing forms of visual signalling.<ref>{{cite book|last=Regal|first=Brian|year=2005|title=Radio: The Life Story of a Technology|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|page=22|isbn=0313331677}}</ref> Hertz's death in 1894 brought published reviews of his earlier discoveries including a demonstration on the transmission and detection of radio waves by the British physicist [[Oliver Lodge]] and an article about Hertz's work by [[Augusto Righi]]. Righi's article renewed Marconi's interest in developing a wireless telegraphy system based on radio waves,<ref>[[#Hong|Hong]], p. 19</ref> a line of inquiry that Marconi noted other inventors did not seem to be pursuing.<ref name="ABC-CLIO">{{cite book|title=Icons of Invention: The Makers of the Modern World from Gutenberg to Gates|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WKuG-VIwID8C&pg=PA162|year=2009|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-0-313-34743-6|page=162}}</ref>

====Developing radio telegraphy====
[[File:Marconi's first radio transmitter.jpg|thumb|Marconi's first transmitter incorporating a [[monopole antenna]]. It consisted of an elevated copper sheet ''(top)'' connected to a Righi spark gap ''(left)'' powered by an [[induction coil]] ''(centre)'' with a [[telegraph key]] ''(right)'' to switch it on and off to spell out text messages in [[Morse code]].]]

At the age of 20, Marconi began to conduct experiments in radio waves, building much of his own equipment in the attic of his home at the Villa Griffone in Pontecchio (now an administrative subdivision of [[Sasso Marconi]]), Italy, with the help of his butler, Mignani. Marconi built on Hertz's original experiments and, at the suggestion of Righi, began using a [[coherer]], an early detector based on the 1890 findings of French physicist [[Édouard Branly]] and used in Lodge's experiments, that [[Electrical resistance and conductance|changed resistance]] when exposed to radio waves.<ref name="Brown141">{{cite book|last=Brown|first=Antony|title=Great Ideas in Communications|publisher=D. White Co.|year=1969|page=141}}</ref> In the summer of 1894, he built a storm alarm made up of a battery, a coherer, and an electric bell, which went off when it picked up the radio waves generated by lightning.

Late one night, in December 1894, Marconi demonstrated a radio transmitter and receiver to his mother, a set-up that made a bell ring on the other side of the room by pushing a telegraphic button on a bench.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/xmarconi.html|title=Guglielmo Marconi, padre della radio|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130602093434/http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/xmarconi.html|archive-date=2 June 2013|website=Radiomarconi.com|url-status=usurped|access-date=12 July 2012}}</ref><ref name="Brown141"/> Supported by his father, Marconi continued to read through the literature and picked up on the ideas of physicists who were experimenting with radio waves. He developed devices, such as portable transmitters and receiver systems, that could work over long distances,<ref name="ABC-CLIO"/> turning what was essentially a laboratory experiment into a useful communication system.<ref>[[#Hong|Hong]], p. 22</ref> Marconi came up with a functional system with many components:<ref>Marconi delineated his 1895 apparatus in his Nobel Award speech. See: Marconi, "[http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1909/marconi-lecture.html Wireless Telegraphic Communication: Nobel Lecture, 11 December 1909.]" Nobel Lectures. Physics 1901–1921. Amsterdam: Elsevier Publishing Company, 1967: 196–222. p. 198.</ref>
* A relatively simple [[oscillator]] or [[spark-gap transmitter|spark-producing]] radio transmitter;
* A [[wire]] or metal sheet capacity area suspended at a height above the ground;
* A [[coherer]] receiver, which was a modification of [[Édouard Branly]]'s original device with refinements to increase sensitivity and reliability;
* A [[telegraph key]] to operate the transmitter to send short and long pulses, corresponding to the dots-and-dashes of [[Morse code]]; and
* A telegraph register activated by the [[coherer]] which recorded the received [[Morse code]] dots and dashes onto a roll of paper tape.

In the summer of 1895, Marconi moved his experiments outdoors on his father's estate in Bologna. He tried different arrangements and shapes of antenna but even with improvements he was able to transmit signals only up to one half-mile, a distance Oliver Lodge had predicted in 1894 as the maximum transmission distance for radio waves.<ref>[[#Hong|Hong]], p. 6</ref>

====Transmission breakthrough====

A breakthrough came in the summer of 1895, when Marconi found that a much greater range could be achieved after he raised the height of his antenna and, borrowing from a technique used in wired telegraphy, [[Ground (electricity)|grounded]] his transmitter and receiver. With these improvements, the system was capable of transmitting signals up to {{Convert|2|mi}} and over hills.<ref>[[#Hong|Hong]], pp. 20–22</ref><ref>{{cite speech|last=Marconi|first=Guglielmo|title=Wireless Telegraphic Communication|event=Nobel Lecture|date=11 December 1909|location=Amsterdam|publisher=Elsevier Publishing Company|url=http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1909/marconi-lecture.html|pages=196–222}}</ref> The [[monopole antenna]] reduced the frequency of the waves compared to the [[dipole antenna]]s used by Hertz, and radiated [[vertical polarization|vertically polarized]] radio waves which could travel longer distances. By this point, he concluded that a device could become capable of spanning greater distances, with additional funding and research, and would prove valuable both commercially and militarily. Marconi's experimental apparatus proved to be the first engineering-complete, commercially successful [[radio transmission]] system.<ref name="SaturdayThompson">The Saturday review of politics, literature, science and art, Vol. 93. "[https://books.google.com/books?id=gHVHAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA556 The Inventor of Wireless Telegraphy: A Reply. To the Editor of the Saturday Review]" Guglielmo Marconi and "[https://books.google.com/books?id=gHVHAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA598 Wireless Telegraphy: A Rejoinder. To the Editor of the Saturday Review]," [[Silvanus P. Thompson]].</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/stravolgimento1.html|archive-url=https://archive.today/20120907033444/http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/stravolgimento1.html|url-status=usurped|archive-date=7 September 2012|title=Narconi e Lo Stravolgimenti Della Verità Storica Sulla Opera|author=Gualandi, Lodovico|date=26 June 2000|work=radiomarconi.com}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=Wireless Telegraphy|last=Marconi|first=G|journal=Proceedings of the Institution of Electrical Engineers|volume=28|issue=139|publisher=Institution of Electrical Engineers|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-ZYZAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA294|page=294|date=March 1899}}</ref>

Marconi applied to the Italian Ministry of Post and Telegraphs, then under the direction of Maggiorino Ferraris,<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://notes9.senato.it/Web/senregno.NSF/d7aba38662bfb3b8c125785e003c4334/fdbbeb0aa5d227f44125646f005baf3f?OpenDocument |title=Senato della Repubblica "Ferraris Maggiorino" |access-date=2 April 2022 |archive-date=3 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231003023704/https://notes9.senato.it/Web/senregno.NSF/d7aba38662bfb3b8c125785e003c4334/fdbbeb0aa5d227f44125646f005baf3f?OpenDocument |url-status=dead }}</ref> explaining his wireless telegraph machine and asking for funding, but never received a response. An apocryphal tale claims that the minister (incorrectly named first as Emilio Sineo, later as Pietro Lacava<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.icsm.it/articoli/ri/marconisiluro.html#1|last=Finizio|first=Giuseppe|title=Guglielmo Marconi and the radio-guided torpedo|date=29 January 2024 }}</ref>) wrote "to the Longara" on the document, referring to the insane asylum on Via della Lungara in Rome, but the letter was never found.<ref>Solari, Luigi (February 1948) "Guglielmo Marconi e la Marina Militare Italiana", ''Rivista Marittima''</ref>

In 1896, Marconi spoke with his family friend Carlo Gardini, Honorary Consul at the United States Consulate in Bologna, about leaving Italy to go to [[Great Britain]]. Gardini wrote a letter of introduction to the Ambassador of Italy in London, Annibale Ferrero, explaining who Marconi was and about his extraordinary discoveries. In his response, Ambassador Ferrero advised them not to reveal Marconi's results until after a patent was obtained. He also encouraged Marconi to come to Britain, where he believed it would be easier to find the necessary funds to convert his experiments into practical use. Finding little interest or appreciation for his work in Italy, Marconi travelled to [[London]] in early 1896 at the age of 21, accompanied by his mother, to seek support for his work. (He spoke fluent English in addition to Italian.) Marconi arrived at [[Dover]], and the Customs officer opened his case to find various apparatuses. The customs officer immediately contacted [[Admiralty (United Kingdom)|the Admiralty]] in London. With worries in the UK about Italian anarchists and suspicion Marconi was importing a bomb, his equipment was destroyed.

While in the UK, Marconi gained the interest and support of [[William Preece]], the Chief Electrical Engineer of the [[General Post Office]] (the GPO). Marconi applied for a patent on 2 June 1896. British Patent number 12039 titled "Improvements in Transmitting Electrical impulses and Signals, and in Apparatus therefor", which became the first patent for a communication system based on radio waves.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.seas.columbia.edu/marconi/history.html|title=Marconi – Marconi History|website=seas.columbia.edu}}</ref>

====Demonstrations and achievements====
[[File:Post Office Engineers.jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|[[General Post Office|British Post Office]] engineers inspect Marconi's radio equipment during a demonstration on [[Flat Holm]] Island, 13 May 1897. The transmitter is at the centre, the coherer receiver below it, and the pole supporting the wire antenna is visible at top.]]

Marconi made the first demonstration of his system for the British government in July 1896.<ref>{{cite web|title=Flickr Photo|url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/psd/164193649/|date=9 June 2006}}</ref> A further series of demonstrations for the British followed, and, by March 1897, Marconi had transmitted Morse code signals over a distance of about {{convert|3|mi|km|0}} across [[Salisbury Plain]]. On 13 May 1897, Marconi sent the first ever wireless communication over the open sea – a message was transmitted over the [[Bristol Channel]] from [[Flat Holm]] Island to [[Lavernock Point]] near [[Cardiff]], a distance of {{convert|3|mi|km}}. The message read "Are you ready".<ref>BBC Wales, {{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/historyhunters/locations/pages/3_1_flatholm.shtml|title=Marconi's Waves|access-date=20 January 2007|url-status=bot: unknown|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070120163444/http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/historyhunters/locations/pages/3_1_flatholm.shtml|archive-date=20 January 2007 }}</ref> The transmitting equipment was almost immediately relocated to [[Brean Down Fort]] on the [[Somerset]] coast, stretching the range to {{convert|10|mi|km}}.

[[File:Marconi in London.jpg|left|thumb|upright=1|Plaque on the outside of the [[BT Centre]] commemorates Marconi's first public transmission of wireless signals.]]

Impressed by these and other demonstrations, Preece introduced Marconi's ongoing work to the general public at two important London lectures: "Telegraphy without Wires", at the [[Toynbee Hall]] on 11 December 1896; and "Signalling through Space without Wires", given to the [[Royal Institution]] on 4 June 1897.<ref>{{Cite journal|date=23 January 1897|title=Telegraphy Without Wires|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/26120030|journal=[[Scientific American]]|volume=76|issue=4|pages=55–56|jstor=26120030}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|date=17 December 1897|title=Signalling Through Space Without Wires|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1623911|journal=[[Science (journal)|Science]]|volume=6|issue=155|pages=889–896|doi=10.1126/science.6.155.889|jstor=1623911|pmid=17740846|bibcode=1897Sci.....6..889.|last1=Preece|first1=W.H.|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

Numerous additional demonstrations followed, and Marconi began to receive international attention. In July 1897, he carried out a series of tests at [[La Spezia]], in his home country, for the Italian government. A test for [[Lloyd's of London|Lloyd's]] between The Marine Hotel in [[Ballycastle, County Antrim|Ballycastle]] and [[Rathlin Island]], both in [[County Antrim]] in [[Ulster]], [[Ireland]], was conducted on 6 July 1898 by [[George Stephen Kemp|George Kemp]] and [[Edward Edwin Glanville]].<ref name="Mollan">{{cite book|last1=Mollan|first1=Charles|title=It's Part of What We Are: Volume 1|date=2007|publisher=Royal Dublin Society|isbn=9780860270553|location=Dublin|page=1407}}</ref> A transmission across the [[English Channel]] was accomplished on 27 March 1899, from [[Wimereux]], France to [[South Foreland Lighthouse]], England. Marconi set up an experimental base at the [[Haven Hotel]], [[Sandbanks]], [[Poole Harbour]], [[Dorset]], where he erected a 100-foot high mast. He became friends with the van Raaltes, the owners of [[Brownsea Island]] in Poole Harbour, and his steam yacht, the ''[[Elettra (ship 1904)|Elettra]]'', was often moored on Brownsea or at The Haven Hotel. Marconi purchased the vessel after the Great War and converted it to a seaborne laboratory from where he conducted many of his experiments. Among the ''Elettra''{{'}}s crew was [[Adelmo Landini]], his personal radio operator, who was also an inventor.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Risi|first=Giacomo Bortolotti, Fabio|title=Adelmo Landini "Sasso Marconi Foto|url=https://www.sassomarconifoto.it/index.php/personaggi-del-sasso/adelmo-landini/|access-date=21 October 2020|language=it}}</ref>

In December 1898, the British lightship service authorised the establishment of wireless communication between the [[South Foreland]] lighthouse at [[Dover]] and the East Goodwin [[Lightvessel|lightship]], twelve miles distant. On 17 March 1899, the East Goodwin lightship sent the first [[CQD#History of wireless distress rescues|wireless distress signal]], a signal on behalf of the merchant vessel ''Elbe'' which had run aground on [[Goodwin Sands]]. The message was received by the radio operator of the South Foreland lighthouse, who summoned the aid of the [[Ramsgate]] lifeboat.<ref>{{cite journal|url=https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015030656105;view=1up;seq=117|title=Marconi's Wireless Telegraph|first=Cleveland|last=Moffett|journal=McClure's Magazine|date=June 1899|pages=99–112}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/connecting-britain/first-ever-radio-distress-call/|archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220111/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/connecting-britain/first-ever-radio-distress-call/|archive-date=11 January 2022|url-access=subscription|url-status=live|title=This week in tech|newspaper=The Telegraph|date=17 March 2017|location=London}}{{cbignore}}</ref>
[[File:SS Ponce Entering New York Harbor 1899, by Milton J. Burns.jpg|thumb|SS ''Ponce'' entering New York Harbor 1899, by Milton J. Burns]]

In 1899, Marconi sailed to the United States at the invitation of ''[[The New York Herald]]'' newspaper to cover [[1899 America's Cup|that year's America's Cup]] international yacht races off [[Sandy Hook, New Jersey]]. His first demonstration was a transmission from aboard the SS ''Ponce'', a passenger ship of the [[Porto Rico Line]].<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Helgesen|first=Henry N.|title=Wireless Goes to Sea: Marconi's Radio and SS Ponce|journal=Sea History|issue=Spring 2008|page=122}}</ref> Marconi left for [[England]] on 8 November 1899 on the [[American Line]]'s {{SS|Saint Paul}}, and he and his assistants installed wireless equipment aboard during the voyage. Marconi's wireless brought news of the [[Second Boer War]], which had begun a month before their departure, to passengers at the request of "some of the officials of the American line."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Marconi|first=Guglielmo|date=2 February 1900|title=Wireless Telegraphy|url=https://library.si.edu/digital-library/book/annualreportofbo1901smit|journal=Smithsonian Annual Report, 1901|pages=294}}</ref> On 15 November the ''SS Saint Paul'' became the first ocean liner to report her imminent return to Great Britain by wireless when Marconi's Royal Needles Hotel radio station contacted her 66 nautical miles off the English coast. The first ''Transatlantic Times'', a newspaper containing wireless transmission news from the Needles Station at the Isle of Wight, was published on board the SS ''Saint Paul'' before its arrival.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Westman|first=Harold|title=Radio Pioneers 1945|publisher=Lindsey Publications|year=2006|isbn=1-55918-346-2|location=Bradley, IL|pages=25}}</ref>

====Transatlantic transmissions====
[[File:Marconi at newfoundland.jpg|thumb|upright=1.5|Marconi watching associates raising the kite (a "Levitor" by [[Baden Baden-Powell]]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.carnetdevol.org/Wireless/marconi-transatlantique.html|title=First Atlantic Ocean crossing by a wireless signal|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130130034523/http://www.carnetdevol.org/Wireless/marconi-transatlantique.html|archive-date=30 January 2013|website=Carnetdevol.org.|accessdate=12 July 2012}}</ref>) used to lift the antenna at [[St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador|St. John's, Newfoundland]], December 1901]]

[[File:Detector magnetico Marconi 1902 - Museo scienza e tecnologia Milano.jpg|thumb|left|Magnetic detector by Marconi used during the experimental campaign aboard a ship in summer 1902, exhibited at the [[Museo Nazionale Scienza e Tecnologia Leonardo da Vinci]] of Milan]]

At the turn of the 20th century, Marconi began investigating a means to signal across the Atlantic to compete with the [[transatlantic telegraph cable]]s. Marconi established a wireless transmitting station at Marconi House, [[Rosslare Strand]], [[County Wexford]], in 1901 to act as a link between [[Poldhu]] in [[Cornwall]], England, and [[Clifden]] in [[Connemara]], [[County Galway]], Ireland. He soon made the announcement that the message was received at [[Signal Hill (Newfoundland and Labrador)|Signal Hill]] in [[St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador|St. John's]], [[Newfoundland and Labrador|Newfoundland]] (now part of [[Canada]]), on 12 December 1901, using a {{convert|500|ft|m|adj=on}} kite-supported antenna for reception – signals transmitted by the company's new high-power station at [[Poldhu]], Cornwall. The distance between the two points was about {{convert|2200|mi|km}}. It was heralded as a great scientific advance, yet there also was – and continues to be – considerable scepticism about this claim. The exact wavelength used is not known, but it is fairly reliably determined to have been in the neighbourhood of 350 metres (frequency ≈ 850&nbsp;kHz). The tests took place at a time of day during which the entire transatlantic path was in daylight. It is now known (although Marconi did not know then) that this was the worst possible choice. At this medium wavelength, long-distance transmission in the daytime is not possible because of the heavy absorption of the skywave in the ionosphere. It was not a blind test; Marconi knew in advance to listen for a repetitive signal of three clicks, signifying the Morse code letter ''S''. The clicks were reported to have been heard faintly and sporadically. There was no independent confirmation of the reported reception, and the transmissions were difficult to distinguish from atmospheric noise. A detailed technical review of Marconi's early transatlantic work appears in John S. Belrose's work of 1995. The Poldhu transmitter was a two-stage circuit.<ref>{{cite journal|doi=10.1109/MAP.2004.1305565|year=2004|journal=IEEE Antennas and Propagation Magazine|volume=46|issue=2|page=130|title=Marconi and the History of Radio}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|doi=10.1049/cp:19950787|chapter=Fessenden and Marconi: Their differing technologies and transatlantic experiments during the first decade of this century|title=International Conference on 100 Years of Radio|date=1995|last1=Belrose|first1=J.S.|volume=1995|pages=32–43|isbn=0-85296-649-0 }}</ref>

[[File:Guglielmo Marconi 1901 wireless signal.jpg|thumb|Marconi demonstrating apparatus he used in his first long-distance radio transmissions in the 1890s. The transmitter is at the right, the receiver with paper tape recorder at the left.]]
[[File:Guglielmo, Marchese Marconi. Colour lithograph by Sir L. War Wellcome V0003849.jpg|upright|thumb|Marconi caricatured by [[Leslie Ward]] for ''[[Vanity Fair (British magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'' magazine, 1905]]

Feeling challenged by sceptics, Marconi prepared a better-organised and documented test. In February 1902, the SS ''Philadelphia'' sailed west from Great Britain with Marconi aboard, carefully recording signals sent daily from the Poldhu station. The test results produced [[Magnetic detector|coherer-tape]] reception up to {{convert|1550|mi|km}}, and audio reception up to {{convert|2100|mi|km}}. The maximum distances were achieved at night, and these tests were the first to show that radio signals for [[medium wave]] and [[longwave]] transmissions travel much farther at night than during the day. During the daytime, signals had been received up to only about {{convert|700|mi|km}}, less than half of the distance claimed earlier at Newfoundland, where the transmissions had also taken place during the day. Because of this, Marconi had not fully confirmed the Newfoundland claims, although he did prove that radio signals could be sent for hundreds of kilometres (miles), despite some scientists' belief that they were limited essentially to line-of-sight distances.

On 17 December 1902, a transmission from the Marconi station in [[Glace Bay]], Nova Scotia, Canada, became the world's first radio message to cross the Atlantic from North America. In 1901, Marconi built a station near [[Wellfleet, Massachusetts|South Wellfleet, Massachusetts]], that sent a message of greetings on 18 January 1903 from United States President [[Theodore Roosevelt]] to King [[Edward VII]] of the United Kingdom. However, consistent transatlantic signalling was difficult to establish.<ref>{{Cite web|title=TR Center – Talking Across the Ocean|url=https://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Blog/Item/Talking%20Across%20the%20Ocean|access-date=2021-03-12|website=theodorerooseveltcenter.org}}</ref>

Marconi began to build high-powered stations on both sides of the Atlantic to communicate with ships at sea, in competition with other inventors. In 1904, he established a commercial service to transmit nightly news summaries to subscribing ships, which could incorporate them into their on-board newspapers. A regular transatlantic radio-telegraph service was finally begun on 17 October 1907<ref>{{cite journal|title=The Clifden Station of the Marconi Wireless Telegraph System|journal=Scientific American|date=23 November 1907}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://marconi100.ca/clip/marconi-sydpost19071024.html|title=Second Test of the Marconi Over-Ocean Wireless System Proved Entirely Successful|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131019025942/http://marconi100.ca/clip/marconi-sydpost19071024.html|archive-date=19 October 2013|newspaper=Sydney Daily Post|date=24 October 1907}}</ref> between [[Clifden]], Ireland, and [[Glace Bay]], but even after this the company struggled for many years to provide reliable communication to others.

====''Titanic''====
The role played by Marconi Co. wireless in maritime rescues raised public awareness of the value of radio and brought fame to Marconi, particularly the sinking of [[RMS Titanic|RMS ''Titanic'']] on 15 April 1912 and [[RMS Lusitania|RMS ''Lusitania'']] on 7 May 1915.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Who was Guglielmo Marconi? Guglielmo Marconie was the first to patent (though not invent) a wireless system for communications.|url=https://www.curriculumvisions.com/search/M/marconi/marconi.html|access-date=2021-03-09|website=curriculumvisions.com}}</ref>

[[RMS Titanic|RMS ''Titanic'']] radio operators [[Jack Phillips (wireless operator)|Jack Phillips]] and [[Harold Bride]] were not employed by the [[White Star Line]] but by the [[Marconi International Marine Communication Company]]. After the sinking of the ocean liner, survivors were rescued by the [[RMS Carpathia|RMS ''Carpathia'']] of the [[Cunard Line]].<ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite book|isbn=978-0857330246|title=Titanic Triumph and Tragedy: Third Edition|last1=Eaton|first1=John P.|last2=Haas|first2=Charles A.|date=December 2011|publisher=Haynes Publishing UK }}</ref> ''Carpathia'' took a total of 17 minutes to both receive and decode the SOS signal sent by ''Titanic''. There was a distance of 58 miles between the two ships.<ref>"Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World|CBC Radio." CBCnews, CBC/Radio Canada, 10 Nov. 2016, www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/marconi-the-man-who-networked-the-world-1.3845164.</ref> When ''Carpathia'' docked in New York, Marconi went aboard with a reporter from ''[[The New York Times]]'' to talk with Bride, the surviving operator.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> After this incident, Marconi gained popularity and became more recognised for his contributions to the field of radio and wireless technology.<ref>RMS Titanic, Inc. "Recovery Expedition to Titanic Sets Target Departure Date for 2021." PR Newswire: News Distribution, Targeting and Monitoring, 22 July 2020,</ref>

On 18 June 1912, Marconi gave evidence to the Court of Inquiry into the loss of ''Titanic'' regarding the marine telegraphy's functions and the procedures for emergencies at sea.<ref>Court of Inquiry ''Loss of the S.S. Titanic'' 1912</ref> Britain's [[Postmaster-General]] summed up, referring to the ''Titanic'' disaster: "Those who have been saved, have been saved through one man, Mr. Marconi ... and his marvellous invention."<ref name="whf">{{cite web|url=http://www.wirelesshistoryfoundation.org/blog/titanics-wireless-connection|title=Titanic's Wireless Connection|date=April 2012|publisher=Wireless History Foundation|access-date=7 October 2013}}</ref> Marconi was offered free passage on ''Titanic'' before she sank, but had taken [[RMS Lusitania|''Lusitania'']] three days earlier. As his daughter Degna later explained, he had paperwork to do and preferred the public stenographer aboard that vessel.<ref>{{cite magazine|title=Seven Famous People Who Missed the Titanic|author=Daugherty, Greg|magazine=Smithsonian Magazine|url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/seven-famous-people-who-missed-the-titanic-101902418/|date=March 2012|access-date=26 February 2023}}</ref>

====Continuing work====
[[File:Marconi Wireless Telegraph 1913 x.jpg|thumb|Share of the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America, issued 20 August 1913]]
Over the years, the Marconi companies gained a reputation for being technically conservative, in particular by continuing to use inefficient spark-transmitter technology, which could be used only for radio-telegraph operations, long after it was apparent that the future of radio communication lay with [[continuous-wave]] transmissions which were more efficient and could be used for audio transmissions. Somewhat belatedly, the company did begin significant work with continuous-wave equipment beginning in 1915, after the introduction of the oscillating vacuum tube (valve). The [[New Street Works]] factory in [[Chelmsford]] was the location for the first entertainment radio [[Broadcasting|broadcast]]s in the [[United Kingdom]] in 1920, employing a vacuum tube transmitter and featuring [[Dame Nellie Melba]]. In 1922, regular entertainment broadcasts commenced from the [[Marconi Research Centre]] at [[Great Baddow]], forming the prelude to the [[BBC]], and he spoke of the close association of aviation and wireless telephony in that same year at a private gathering with [[Florence Tyzack Parbury]], and even spoke of interplanetary wireless communication. In 1924, the Marconi Company co-established the [[Unione Radiofonica Italiana]] (now [[RAI]]).<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.storiadellaradio.rai.it/dl/portali/site/articolo/ContentItem-d3384361-91fc-4b38-b8ab-9ec4031ec7aa.html|title=Storia della Radio dal 1924 al 1933|website=Storia della radio|publisher=Rai|language=it|access-date=2020-02-16}}</ref>

===Later years===
<div style="font-size:115%">
{{quote box|align=left|width=33%|quote=Have I done the world good, or have I added a menace?<ref>{{cite book|isbn=9781134526147|page=296|title=A History of the Marconi Company 1874–1965|last1=Baker|first1=W. J.|date=16 October 2013|publisher=Routledge }}</ref>}}</div>

In 1914, Marconi was made a Senator in the [[Senate of the Kingdom of Italy]] and appointed Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the [[Royal Victorian Order]] in the UK. During [[World War I]], Italy joined the Allied side of the conflict, and Marconi was placed in charge of the Italian military's radio service. He attained the rank of lieutenant in the [[Italian Royal Army]] and of commander in the ''[[Regia Marina]]''. In 1929, he was made a [[marquess]] by King [[Victor Emmanuel III]].<ref name=":0" />

[[File:Guglielmo Marconi army.jpg|thumb|Marconi in the army uniform]]
[[Image:Villa Marconi.jpg|thumb|Villa Marconi, with Marconi's tomb in foreground]]

While helping to develop microwave technology, the ''[[Marchese]]'' Marconi suffered nine [[heart attack]]s in the span of three years preceding his death.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Invisible Rainbow|last=Firstenberg|first=Arthur|publisher=AGB Press|year=2017|isbn=978-0-692-68301-9|page=99}}</ref> Marconi died in Rome on 20 July 1937 at age 63, following the ninth, fatal, heart attack, and Italy held a [[state funeral]] for him. As a tribute, shops on the street where he lived were "Closed for national mourning".<ref name=guard>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/news/1937/jul/21/mainsection.fromthearchive|title=Radio falls silent for death of Marconi|website=The Guardian|date=21 July 1937|access-date=10 June 2016}}</ref> In addition, at 6&nbsp;pm the next day, the time designated for the funeral, transmitters around the world observed two minutes of silence in his honour.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23130862-900-marconi-forged-todays-interconnected-world-of-communication/|title=Marconi forged today's interconnected world of communication|first=Andrew|last=Robinson|website=New Scientist}}</ref> The British Post Office also sent a message requesting that all broadcasting ships honour Marconi with two minutes of broadcasting silence.<ref name=guard /> His remains are housed in the [[Mausoleum of Guglielmo Marconi]] in the grounds of Villa Griffone at [[Sasso Marconi]], Emilia-Romagna, which assumed that name in his honour in 1938.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://markpadfield.com/marconicalling/museum/html/places/places-i=13.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140906064514/http://markpadfield.com/marconicalling/museum/html/places/places-i=13.html|archive-date=2014-09-06|title=Villa Griffone, Near Bologna, Italy |website=markpadfield.com}}</ref>

In 1943, Marconi's elegant sailing yacht, the ''[[Elettra (ship 1904)|Elettra]]'', was commandeered and refitted as a warship by the German Navy. She was sunk by the [[Royal Air Force|RAF]] on 22 January 1944. After the war, the Italian Government tried to retrieve the wreckage, to rebuild the boat, and the wreckage was removed to Italy. Eventually, the idea was abandoned, and the wreckage was cut into pieces which were distributed amongst Italian museums.

In 1943, the [[Supreme Court of the United States]] handed down a decision on Marconi's radio patents restoring some of the prior patents of [[Oliver Lodge]], [[John Stone Stone]], and [[Nikola Tesla]].<ref name="LQsxMxEUC page 3">{{cite book|author1=Redouté, Jean-Michel |author2=Steyaert, Michiel|title=EMC of Analog Integrated Circuits|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=c92LQsxMxEUC&pg=PA3|date=2009|publisher=Springer Science & Business Media|isbn=978-90-481-3230-0|page=3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Meadow, Charles T.|title=Making Connections: Communication through the Ages|url=https://archive.org/details/makingconnection00mead|url-access=registration|date=2002|publisher=Scarecrow Press|isbn=978-1-4617-0691-5|page=[https://archive.org/details/makingconnection00mead/page/193 193]}}</ref> The decision was not about Marconi's original radio patents<ref>{{cite web|url=https://earlyradiohistory.us/tesla.htm|title=Nikola Tesla: The Guy Who DIDN'T "Invent Radio|author=White, Thomas H.|date=1 November 2012|publisher=Earlyradiohistory.us }}</ref> and the court declared that their decision had no bearing on Marconi's claim as the first to achieve radio transmission, just that since Marconi's claim to certain patents was questionable, he could not claim infringement on those same patents.<ref>{{cite book|author=Sobot, Robert|title=Wireless Communication Electronics: Introduction to RF Circuits and Design Techniques|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SdGaiV6iup0C&pg=PA4|date=2012|publisher=Springer Science & Business Media|isbn=978-1-4614-1116-1|page=4}}</ref> There are claims the high court was trying to nullify a World War I claim against the United States government by the Marconi Company via simply restoring the non-Marconi prior patent.<ref name="LQsxMxEUC page 3"/>

==Personal life==
[[File:Alfred Norton Goldsmith & Guglielmo Marconi 1922.jpg|right|thumb|American electrical engineer [[Alfred Norton Goldsmith]] and Marconi on 26 June 1922]]

Marconi was a friend of Charles van Raalte and his wife Florence, the owners of [[Brownsea Island]]; and of Margherita, their daughter, and in 1904 he met her [[Irish people|Irish]] friend, [[The Honourable|The Hon.]] Beatrice O'Brien (1882–1976), a daughter of [[Edward O'Brien, 14th Baron Inchiquin|The 14th Baron Inchiquin]]. On 16 March 1905, Beatrice O'Brien and Marconi were married, and spent their honeymoon on Brownsea Island.<ref>{{cite web|last=Padfield|first=Mark|title=Beatrice O'Brien|url=http://markpadfield.com/marconicalling/museum/html/people/people-i=6.html|publisher=Marconi Calling|access-date=24 May 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130624035733/http://markpadfield.com/marconicalling/museum/html/people/people-i=6.html|archive-date=24 June 2013|url-status=dead}}</ref> They had three daughters, Lucia (born and died 1906), Degna (1908–1998), and Gioia (1916–1996), and a son, Giulio, 2nd Marquess Marconi (1910–1971). In 1913, the Marconi family returned to Italy and became part of Rome society. Beatrice served as a lady-in-waiting to [[Elena of Montenegro|Queen Elena]]. At Marconi's request, his marriage to Beatrice was annulled on 27 April 1927, so he could remarry.<ref>{{cite book|isbn=978-1550711516|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NMmStBPCncIC&pg=PA218|title=My Father, Marconi|last1=Marconi|first1=Degna|date=3 October 2023|publisher=Guernica Editions|pages=218–227}}</ref> Marconi and Beatrice had divorced on 12 February 1924 in the free city of [[Fiume]] ([[Rijeka]]).<ref name=":1" />

[[File:Marconi portrait.jpg|thumb|left|Guglielmo and Beatrice Marconi {{Circa|1910}}]]

Marconi went on to marry {{ill|Maria Cristina Bezzi-Scali|it|v=sup}} (2 April 1900 – 15 July 1994), the only daughter of Francesco, [[Count]] Bezzi-Scali. To do this he had to be confirmed in the [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] faith and became a devout member of the Church.<ref>{{cite book|isbn=9780937832394|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wfSABTyeiV4C&dq=marconi+catholic&pg=PA19|pages=19–24|title=Marconi My Beloved|last1=Marconi|first1=Maria Cristina|date=3 October 2023|publisher=Branden Books }}</ref> He had been baptised Catholic but was brought up as a member of the [[Anglicanism|Anglican Church]]. On 12 June 1927, Marconi married Maria Cristina in a civil service, with a religious ceremony performed on 15 June. Marconi was 53 years old and Maria Cristina was 26. They had one daughter, Maria Elettra Elena Anna (born 1930), who married [[Prince]] Carlo Giovannelli (1942–2016) in 1966; they later divorced. For unexplained reasons, Marconi left his entire fortune to his second wife and their only child, and nothing to the children of his first marriage.<ref>{{cite book|isbn=978-1550711516|page=232|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NMmStBPCncIC&pg=PA232|title=My Father, Marconi|last1=Marconi|first1=Degna|date=3 October 2023|publisher=Guernica Editions }}</ref>

Marconi wanted to personally introduce in 1931 the first radio broadcast of a Pope, [[Pope Pius XI|Pius XI]], and announced at the microphone: "With the help of God, who places so many mysterious forces of nature at man's disposal, I have been able to prepare this instrument which will give to the faithful of the entire world the joy of listening to the voice of the Holy Father".<ref>{{cite web|title=80 Years of Vatican Radio, Pope Pius XI and Marconi. .. and Father Jozef Murgas?|publisher=Saint Benedict Center|url=http://catholicism.org/80-years-of-vatican-radio-pope-pius-xi-and-marconi-and-father-jozef-murgas.html|date=18 February 2011}}</ref>

===Fascism===
Marconi joined the [[National Fascist Party]] in 1923.<ref>Physicsworld.com, "''[http://physicsweb.org/articles/world/14/12/7 Guglielmo Marconi: radio star]''", 2001 {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070714032100/http://physicsweb.org/articles/world/14/12/7|date=14 July 2007 }}</ref> In 1930, Italian dictator [[Benito Mussolini]] appointed him President of the [[Royal Academy of Italy]], which made Marconi a member of the [[Grand Council of Fascism|Fascist Grand Council]]. Marconi was an [[apologist]] for [[Fascism and ideology|fascist ideology]] and actions such as the Italian invasion of Ethiopia in the [[Second Italo-Abyssinian War]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1935/08/29/archives/marconi-to-join-italian-forces-in-ethiopia-likely-to-direct.html|title=Marconi to Join Italian Forces in Ethiopia; Likely to Direct Communications Service|newspaper=The New York Times|agency=Associated Press|date=29 August 1935}}</ref><ref> Richard Owen, "Marconi book broadcasts his Fascist role." ''The Times'' (London, England) (March 22, 1997): 16-16. </ref>

In his lecture he stated: "I reclaim the honour of being the first fascist in the field of radiotelegraphy, the first who acknowledged the utility of joining the electric rays in a bundle, as Mussolini was the first in the political field who acknowledged the necessity of merging all the healthy energies of the country into a bundle, for the greater greatness of Italy".<ref>Franco Monteleone, La radio italiana nel periodo fascista: studio e documenti, 1922–1945, Marsilio Editore, 1976, p. 44.</ref> Not one Jew was allowed to join the Royal Academy during Marconi's tenure as president from 1930, three years before [[Adolf Hitler]] took power in Germany and eight years before [[Benito Mussolini]]'s race laws brought his regime's [[antisemitism]] into the open.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/mar/19/physicalsciences.humanities|title=Marconi blocked Jews from Il Duce's academy|work=The Guardian|author=Roy Carroll|date=19 March 2002|accessdate=1 June 2022}}</ref>

==Legacy and honours==

===Archives===
* A large collection of Marconi artefacts was held by [[The General Electric Company]], plc (GEC) of the United Kingdom which later renamed itself Marconi plc and Marconi Corporation plc. In December 2004 the extensive Marconi Collection, held at the former Marconi Research Centre at [[Great Baddow]], [[Chelmsford]], Essex UK was donated to the nation by the Company via the [[University of Oxford]].<ref>[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/berkshire/4072929.stm UK{{!}}England{{!}}Berkshire{{!}}Marconi archives move to Oxford]. BBC News (6 December 2004). Retrieved on 10 June 2016.</ref> This consisted of the BAFTA award-winning MarconiCalling website, some 250+ physical artefacts and the massive ephemera collection of papers, books, patents and many other items. The artefacts are now held by [[Museum of the History of Science, Oxford|The Museum of the History of Science]] and the ephemera Archives by the nearby [[Bodleian Library]].<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20120404155532/http://www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/news/2008_nov_07 Catalogue of the Marconi Archive now available online]. bodleian.ox.ac.uk (7 November 2008)</ref> Following three years' work at the Bodleian, an Online Catalogue to the Marconi Archives was released in November 2008.

[[File:Lire 2000 (Guglielmo Marconi).JPG|thumb|[[Italian lira]] banknote, 1990 issue]]

===Orders and decorations===
;Italian
* Knight of the [[Order of Merit for Labour]] (26 October 1902)<ref name="Senator_Marconi"/>
* Knight of the [[Civil Order of Savoy]] (1 June 1905)<ref name="Senator_Marconi"/>
* Grand Cordon of the [[Order of the Crown of Italy]] (7 April 1913; Grand Officer: 30 October 1902; Officer: 6 January 1898)<ref name="Senator_Marconi"/>
* Grand Cordon of the [[Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus]] (14 January 1932; Grand Officer: 30 May 1912; Commander: 12 January 1902)<ref name="Senator_Marconi"/><ref>{{Cite news|newspaper=The Times|title=Signor Marconi|date=20 September 1902|page=5|issue=36878}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last=Nobel Foundation|title=Nobel Lectures Physics 1901–1921|publisher=[[Elsevier]]|year=1967|isbn=978-981-02-3401-0}}</ref>
* Marquis of Marconi (17 July 1929)<ref name="Senator_Marconi">{{cite web|url=https://patrimonio.archivio.senato.it/repertorio-senatori-regno/senatore/IT-SEN-SEN0001-001368/marconi-guglielmo|title=Senato della republica: MARCONI Guglielmo|website=Senato della republica|publisher=Government of Italy|access-date=3 September 2024}}</ref>
;Others
* Grand Cross of the [[Order of Saint Anna]] of the [[Russian Empire|Russia Empire]] (1902)<ref>{{Cite book|last=Marconi|first=Maria Cristina|title=Marconi My Beloved|publisher=Dante University of America Press|year=2011|isbn=978-0-9378-3236-3}}</ref><ref name=":0" />
* Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the [[Royal Victorian Order]] of the [[United Kingdom]] (GCVO, 1914)<ref name=":0" />
* Grand Cross of the [[Civil Order of Alfonso XII]] of Spain<ref name="Senator_Marconi"/>
* Grand Cordon of the [[Order of the Rising Sun]] of Japan (1933)<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RqVHDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA265|title=Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World|first=Marc|last=Raboy|date=2016|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-931358-7|via=Google Books}}</ref>

===Honours and awards===
[[File:Memorial plaque in honor of Guglielmo Marconi in the Basilica Santa Croce, Florence. Italy.jpg|thumb|Memorial plaque in the Basilica [[Santa Croce, Florence]]. Italy]]
* In 1901, he was elected as a member of the [[American Philosophical Society]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=APS Member History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=1901&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced|access-date=2021-05-19|website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref>
* In 1903, Marconi also received the freedom of the City of Rome.<ref name=":0" />
* In 1909, Marconi shared the [[Nobel Prize in Physics]] with [[Karl Ferdinand Braun]] for their "contributions to the development of wireless telegraphy" (radio communications).<ref name="NPbio"/>
* In 1914, Marconi was named senator by the king of Italy [[Vittorio Emanuele III]]<ref name=":0" />
* In 1918, he was awarded the [[Franklin Institute]]'s [[Franklin Medal]].<ref>{{Cite web|date=2014-01-15|title=Guglielmo Marconi|url=https://www.fi.edu/laureates/guglielmo-marconi|access-date=2021-03-10|website=The Franklin Institute}}</ref>
* In 1920, he was awarded the [[IRE Medal of Honor]], now the [[IEEE Medal of Honor]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.ieee.org/content/dam/ieee-org/ieee/web/org/about/awards/recipients/complete-past-and-present-recipient-list.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210122021403/https://www.ieee.org/content/dam/ieee-org/ieee/web/org/about/awards/recipients/complete-past-and-present-recipient-list.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-date=22 January 2021|title=The List of IEEE Medal of Honor Recipients|website=[[Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers]] (IEEE)|access-date=2 October 2023}}</ref>
* In 1931, he was awarded the [[John Scott Medal]] by the [[Franklin Institute]] and the [[Philadelphia City Council|City Council of Philadelphia]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=John Scott Award Recipients |url=http://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/johnscottaward/johnscottaward(full).html|access-date=2021-03-10|website=garfield.library.upenn.edu|archive-date=15 June 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210615165455/https://www.garfield.library.upenn.edu/johnscottaward/johnscottaward%28full%29.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>
* In 1934, he was awarded the [[Wilhelm Exner Medal]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Guglielmo Marconi|url=https://www.wilhelmexner.org/medalists/guglielmo-marconi/|access-date=2021-03-10|website=Wilhelm Exner Medaillen Stiftung|language=de-AT}}</ref>
* In 1974, Italy marked the birth centennial of Marconi with a circulating commemorative [[Italian lira|Lire&nbsp;]]100 coin.<ref>{{Cite web|title=This Day in History: April 25|url=https://www.coinworld.com/news/precious-metals/this-day-in-history-april-25.html|access-date=2021-03-10|website=CoinWorld|language=en}}</ref>
* In 1975, Marconi was inducted into the [[National Inventors Hall of Fame]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Search for Famous Inventors {{!}} National Inventors Hall of Fame|url=https://www.invent.org/inductees/search?combine=Marconi|access-date=2021-03-10|website=invent.org}}</ref>
* In 1978, Marconi was inducted into the [[NAB Broadcasting Hall of Fame]].<ref>{{Cite web|last=Broadcasters|first=National Association of|title=NAB Awards {{!}} Past Award Recipients|url=https://www.nab.org/events/awards/pastAwardWinners.asp|access-date=2021-03-10|website=National Association of Broadcasters}}</ref>
* In 1988, the Radio Hall of Fame ([[Museum of Broadcast Communications]], Chicago) inducted Marconi as a Pioneer (soon after the inception of its awards).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.radiohof.org/pioneer/marconi.html|access-date=30 May 2012|work=radiohof.org|title=Pioneer: Guglielmo Marconi|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120505204928/http://www.radiohof.org/pioneer/marconi.html|archive-date=5 May 2012}}</ref>
* In 1990, the [[Banca d'Italia|Bank of Italy]] issued a [[Italian lira|Lire&nbsp;]]2,000 banknote featuring his portrait on the front and on the back his accomplishments.<ref>[http://banknote.ws/COLLECTION/countries/EUR/ITA/ITA0115.htm Italy 2,000 lira banknote (1990)] Banknote Museum (banknote.ws). Retrieved on 17 March 2013.</ref>
* In 2001, Great Britain released a commemorative [[British two pound coin#Special issues|£2 coin]] celebrating the 100th anniversary of Marconi's first wireless communication.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Two Pound Coin Designs and Specifications {{!}} The Royal Mint|url=https://www.royalmint.com/discover/uk-coins/coin-design-and-specifications/two-pound-coin/|access-date=2021-03-10|website=royalmint.com}}</ref>
* Marconi's early experiments in wireless telegraphy were the subject of two [[List of IEEE milestones|IEEE Milestones]]; one in Switzerland in 2003<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/Milestones:Marconi%27s_Early_Wireless_Experiments,_1895|title=Milestones:Marconi's Early Wireless Experiments, 1895|work=IEEE Global History Network|publisher=IEEE|access-date=29 July 2011}}</ref> and most recently in Italy in 2011.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ieeeghn.org/wiki/index.php/Milestones:List_of_IEEE_Milestones|title=List of IEEE Milestones|work=IEEE Global History Network|publisher=IEEE|access-date=29 July 2011}}</ref>
* In 2009, Italy issued a commemorative silver 10 Euro coin honouring the centennial of Marconi's Nobel Prize.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Italy (1861–Now) – Italy Silver Coin – 7 – Vatican|url=https://vatican.com/14/Italy-1861-Now-Italy-Silver-Coin/|access-date=2021-03-10|website=vatican.com}}</ref>
* In 2009, he was inducted into the [[New Jersey Hall of Fame]].<ref>[http://www.accesshollywood.com/new-jersey-to-jon-bon-jovi-you-give-us-a-good-name_article_13374 New Jersey to Bon Jovi: You Give Us a Good Name]. accesshollywood.com (2 February 2009).</ref>
* The Dutch radio academy bestows the {{ill|Marconi Award (Netherlands)|nl|Marconi Award|lt=Marconi Awards}} annually for outstanding radio programmes, presenters and stations.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Freek|date=2014-10-13|title=Nominaties Marconi Awards bekend|url=https://www.radiofreak.nl/nominaties-marconi-awards-bekend-2/|access-date=2021-01-02|website=RadioFreak.nl|language=nl}}</ref>
* The National Association of Broadcasters (US) bestows the annual [[NAB Marconi Radio Awards]] also for outstanding radio programmes and stations.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Broadcasters|first=National Association of|title=NAB Awards {{!}} Overview|url=https://www.nab.org/events/awards/overview.asp|access-date=2021-01-02|website=National Association of Broadcasters}}</ref>

===Tributes===
[[File:Guglielmo Marconi Memorial.JPG|thumb|''[[Guglielmo Marconi (Piccirilli)|Guglielmo Marconi Memorial]]'' in Washington, D.C.]]
[[File:Guglielmo Marconi Statue Sculpture by Giancarlo Saleppichi, 1975-erected at Marconi Plaza Philadelphia PA Photo date 01-06-2020.jpeg|thumb|Bronze statue of Guglielmo Marconi, sculpted by Saleppichi Giancarlo erected 1975 [[Philadelphia]], Pennsylvania]]
[[File:100 Lire Italiane - Centenario di Guglielmo Marconi 02.png|thumb|Italian [[Coins of the Italian lira|100 lire]] coin from 1974 commemorating the centenary of Marconi's birth]]
* A funerary monument to the effigy of Marconi can be seen in the [[Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence]], but his remains are in the [[Mausoleum of Guglielmo Marconi]] in [[Sasso Marconi]], Italy. His former villa, adjacent to the [[mausoleum]] is the [[Marconi Museum (Italy)]] with much of his equipment.
* A [[Guglielmo Marconi (Piccirilli)|''Guglielmo Marconi'' sculpture]] by [[Attilio Piccirilli]] stands in [[Washington, D.C.]]<ref>{{Cite web|title=Guglielmo Marconi, (sculpture).|url=https://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?&profile=all&source=~!siartinventories&uri=full=3100001~!323772~!0#focus|access-date=2021-03-13|website=siris-artinventories.si.edu}}</ref>
* A granite obelisk stands on the cliff top near the site of Marconi's [[Poldhu#Marconi's Poldhu Wireless Station|Marconi's Poldhu Wireless Station]] in Cornwall, commemorating the first transatlantic transmission.
* [[Marconi Plaza]] Park, an urban park square named after the inventor in 1937, is located [[Philadelphia]], Pennsylvania at Oregon Ave and South Broad Street. It includes a later 1975 bronze statue of Marconi erected on the east side.
* ''Marconi Plays The Mambo'' are [[lyrics]] written by co-writers [[Martin Page]] and [[Bernie Taupin]] to the 1985 hit single [[We Built This City]], performed by American [[rock music|rock]] band [[Starship (band)|Starship]]. The song peaked at No. 1 on the [[Billboard Hot 100|''Billboard'' Hot 100]].

Places and organisations named after Marconi include:

; Outer space:
The asteroid [[1332 Marconia]] is named in his honour. A large [[Marconi (crater)|crater]] on the far side of the [[Moon]] is also named after him.
; Italy
* [[Bologna Guglielmo Marconi Airport]] (IATA: BLQ – ICAO: LIPE), of Bologna, is named after Marconi, its native son.
* [[Guglielmo Marconi University]], a private, non-profit university in Rome.
* [[Ponte Guglielmo Marconi]], bridge that connects Piazza Augusto Righi with Piazza Tommaso Edison, in Rome.
; Australia
* Australian football (soccer) and social club [[Marconi Stallions]].
; Canada
* The Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company of Canada (now [[CMC Electronics]] and [[Ultra Electronics]]), of [[Montreal]], Quebec, Canada, was created in 1903 by Guglielmo Marconi.<ref name="CMCabout">{{cite web|url=http://www.cmcelectronics.ca/En/About/cmc_profile_en.html|title=CMC Electronics' Profile|access-date=12 January 2007|publisher=CMC Electronics Inc.|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060924145744/http://www.cmcelectronics.ca/En/About/cmc_profile_en.html|archive-date=24 September 2006|url-status=dead}}</ref> In 1925 the company was renamed to the 'Canadian Marconi Company', which was acquired by [[English Electric]] in 1953.<ref name="CMCabout"/> The company name changed again to [[CMC Electronics]] Inc. (French: CMC Électronique) in 2001. In 2002, the company's historical radio business was sold to Ultra Electronics to become Ultra Electronics TCS Inc., now doing business as Ultra Communications. Both CMC Electronics and Ultra Communications are still located in Montreal.
* The [[Marconi National Historic Sites of Canada]] was created by [[Parks Canada]] as a tribute to Marconi's vision in the development of radio telecommunications. The first official wireless message was sent from this location by the Atlantic Ocean to England in 1902. The museum site is located in [[Glace Bay, Nova Scotia]], at Table Head on Timmerman Street.
; United States
* [[Marconi Conference Center State Historic Park|Marconi Conference Center and State Historic Park]], site of the transoceanic Marshall Receiving Station, Marshall.
* [[Marconi-RCA Bolinas Transmitting Station]] in Bolinas, California.
* [[Station KPH, Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America]] in Inverness, California.
* [[Marconi Wireless Telegraphy Station (Kahuku, Hawaii)|Marconi Wireless Telegraphy Station]] on [[Oahu|Oʻahu]]'s [[North Shore (Oahu)|North Shore]], briefly the world's most powerful telegraph station.<ref>[https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn82014682/1914-09-24/ed-1/seq-1/#date1=1914&index=0&rows=20&words=Marconi+MARCONI&searchType=basic&sequence=0&state=Hawaii&date2=1914&proxtext=marconi&y=0&x=0&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1 Honolulu Star-bulletin]. 24 September 1914. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.</ref>
* [[Marconi Beach]] in [[Wellfleet, Massachusetts]], part of the [[Cape Cod National Seashore]], located near the site of his first transatlantic wireless signal from the United States to Britain. There are still remnants of the wireless tower at this beach and at Forest Road Beach in [[Chatham, Massachusetts]].<ref>{{cite web|title=Chatham Marconi Maritime Center|url=http://www.arrl.org/chatham-marconi-maritime-center|website=arrl.org|access-date=9 November 2015}}</ref>
* [[New Brunswick Marconi Station]], now the ''Guglielmo Marconi Memorial Plaza'' in [[Somerset, NJ|Somerset, New Jersey]]. President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points speech was transmitted from the site in 1918.
* Belmar Marconi Station, now the [[Camp Evans Historic District|InfoAge Science History Center]] in Wall Township, New Jersey.
The Marconi Wireless Company of America, the world's first radio company, was incorporated in Roselle Park New Jersey, on West Westfield Avenue, on 22 November 1899.
* [[La Scuola d'Italia Guglielmo Marconi]] on New York City's [[Upper East Side]].
* [[Marconi Plaza, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]]. Roman terrace-styled plaza originally designed by the architects [[Olmsted Brothers]] in 1914–1916, built as the grand entrance for the 1926 [[Sesquicentennial Exposition]] and renamed to honour Marconi.

==Patents==

; United Kingdom
* [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uc2.ark:/13960/t0dv1dp4c;view=1up;seq=322 British patent No. 12,039 (1897)] "''Improvements in Transmitting Electrical impulses and Signals, and in Apparatus therefor''". Date of Application 2 June 1896; Complete Specification Left, 2 March 1897; Accepted, 2 July 1897 (later claimed by Oliver Lodge to contain his own ideas which he failed to patent).
* [http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/marconi/exhibition/7777.htm British patent No. 7,777 (1900)] "''Improvements in Apparatus for Wireless Telegraphy''". Date of Application 26 April 1900; Complete Specification Left, 25 February 1901; Accepted, 13 April 1901.
* [http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/online/modern/marconi/marconi.html#marconi.B.2.1.a British patent No. 10245 (1902)]
* British patent No. 5113 (1904) "''Improvements in Transmitters suitable for Wireless Telegraphy''". Date of Application 1 March 1904; Complete Specification Left, 30 November 1904; Accepted, 19 January August 1905.
* British patent No. 21640 (1904) "''Improvements in Apparatus for Wireless Telegraphy''". Date of Application 8 October 1904; Complete Specification Left, 6 July 1905; Accepted, 10 August 1905.
* British patent No. 14788 (1904) "''Improvements in or relating to Wireless Telegraphy''". Date of Application 18 July 1905; Complete Specification Left, 23 January 1906; Accepted, 10 May 1906.
; United States:
* {{US patent|586193}} "''Transmitting electrical signals''", (using [[Heinrich Ruhmkorff|Ruhmkorff]] coil and [[Morse code]] key) filed December 1896, patented July 1897
* {{US patent|624516}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|627650}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|647007}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|647008}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|647009}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|650109}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|650110}} "''Apparatus employed in wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|668315}} "''Receiver for electrical oscillations''".
* {{US patent|676332}} "''Apparatus for wireless telegraphy''" (later practical version of system)
* {{US patent|757559}} "''Wireless telegraphy system''". Filed 19 November 1901; Issued 19 April 1904.
* {{US patent|760463}} "''Wireless signaling system''". Filed 10 September 1903; Issued 24 May 1904.
* {{US patent|763772}} "''Apparatus for wireless telegraphy''" (Four tuned system; this innovation was predated by N. Tesla, O. Lodge, and J. S. Stone)
* {{US patent|786132}} "''Wireless telegraphy''". Filed 13 October 1903
* {{US patent|792528}} "''Wireless telegraphy''". Filed 13 October 1903; Issued 13 June 1905.
* {{US patent|884986}} "''Wireless telegraphy''". Filed 28 November 1902; Issued 14 April 1908.
* {{US patent|884987}} "''Wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|884988}} "''Detecting electrical oscillations''". Filed 2 February 1903; Issued 14 April 1908.
* {{US patent|884989}} "''Wireless telegraphy''". Filed 2 February 1903; Issued 14 April 1908.
* {{US patent|924560}} "''Wireless signaling system''". Filed 9 August 1906; Issued 8 June 1909.
* {{US patent|935381}} "''Transmitting apparatus for wireless telegraphy''". Filed 10 April 1908; Issued 28 September 1909.
* {{US patent|935382}} "''Apparatus for wireless telegraphy''".
* {{US patent|935383}} "''Apparatus for wireless telegraphy''". Filed 10 April 1908; Issued 28 September 1909.
* {{US patent|954640}} "''Apparatus for wireless telegraphy''". Filed 31 March 1909; Issued 12 April 1910.
* {{US patent|997308}} "''Transmitting apparatus for wireless telegraphy''". Filed 15 July 1910; Issued 11 July 1911.
* {{US patent|1102990}} "''Means for generating alternating electric currents''". Filed 27 January 1914; Issued 7 July 1914.
* {{US patent|1226099}} "''Transmitting apparatus for use in wireless telegraphy and telephony''". Filed 31 December 1913; Issued 15 May 1917.
* {{US patent|1271190}} "''Wireless telegraph transmitter''".
* {{US patent|1377722}} "''Electric accumulator''". Filed 9 March 1918
* {{US patent|1148521}} "''Transmitter for wireless telegraphy''". Filed 20 July 1908; Issued 3 August 1915.
* {{US patent|1981058}} "''Thermionic valve''". Filed 14 October 1926; Issued 20 November 1934.
* {{US patent|RE11913}} "''Transmitting electrical impulses and signals and in apparatus, there-for''". Filed 1 April 1901; Issued 4 June 1901.

== See also ==
* {{anl|History of radio}}
* {{anl|Jagadish Chandra Bose}}
* {{anl|List of people on the postage stamps of Ireland}}
* {{anl|List of covers of Time magazine (1920s)}}

== References ==

{{Reflist}}

== Sources ==
* {{cite book|url=https://monoskop.org/images/f/f4/Hong_Sungook_Wireless_From_Marconis_Black-Box_to_the_Audion.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140819090610/http://monoskop.org/images/f/f4/Hong_Sungook_Wireless_From_Marconis_Black-Box_to_the_Audion.pdf|archive-date=2014-08-19|url-status=live|ref=Hong|author=Hong, Sungook|title=Wireless: From Marconi's Black-Box to the Audion|place=Cambridge, Mass.|publisher=MIT Press|year=2001|isbn=0-262-08298-5}}

== Further reading ==
* Bussey, Gordon, [https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0953896706 ''Marconi's Atlantic Leap''], Marconi Communications, 2000. {{ISBN|0-9538967-0-6}}
* Isted, G.A., [https://web.archive.org/web/20130513103349/https://googledrive.com/host/0B-UggpdTDpJEWnpUdGc5Tkw2aU0/p45.pdf ''Guglielmo Marconi and the History of Radio – Part I''], General Electric Company, p.l.c., ''GEC Review'', Volume 7, No. 1, p. 45, 1991, {{ISSN|0267-9337}}.
* Isted, G.A., [https://web.archive.org/web/20130513104408/https://googledrive.com/host/0B-UggpdTDpJEM3o0UnBqUlpIN1E/p110.pdf ''Guglielmo Marconi and the History of Radio – Part II''], General Electric Company, p.l.c., ''GEC Review'', Volume 7, No. 2, p. 110, 1991, {{ISSN|0267-9337}}.
* Marconi, Degna, ''My Father, Marconi'', James Lorimer & Co, 1982. {{ISBN|0-919511-14-7}} (Italian version): ''Marconi, mio padre'', Di Renzo Editore, 2008, {{ISBN|88-8323-206-2}}.
* Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Company, ''Year book of wireless telegraphy and telephony'', London, England: Published for the Marconi Press Agency Limited., by the St. Catherine Press / Wireless Press. {{LCCN |14017875}}.
* Simons, R.W., [https://web.archive.org/web/20130513101009/https://googledrive.com/host/0B-UggpdTDpJEQTYwV0s4VHgwLW8/p37.htm ''Guglielmo Marconi and Early Systems of Wireless Communication''], General Electric Company, p.l.c., ''GEC Review'', Vol. 11, No. 1, p. 37, 1996, {{ISSN|0267-9337}}.
* Ahern, Steve (ed), ''Making Radio'' (2nd Edition) Allen & Unwin, Sydney, Australia, 2006 {{ISBN|9781741149128}}.
* Aitken, Hugh G.J., ''Syntony and Spark: The Origins of Radio'', New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1976. {{ISBN|0-471-01816-3}}.
* Aitken, Hugh G.J., ''The Continuous Wave: Technology and American Radio, 1900–1932'', Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1985. {{ISBN|0-691-08376-2}}.
* Anderson, Leland I., [http://www.tfcbooks.com/mall/more/431pir.htm Priority in the Invention of Radio – Tesla vs. Marconi]
* Baker, W. J., ''A History of the Marconi Company'', 1970.
* Brodsky, Ira. ''The History of Wireless: How Creative Minds Produced Technology for the Masses'' (Telescope Books, 2008).
* Cheney, Margaret, ''[[Tesla: Man Out of Time]]'' Laurel Publishing, 1981. Chapter 7, esp pp. 69, re: published lectures of Tesla in 1893, copied by Marconi.
* Clark, Paddy, "Marconi's Irish Connections Recalled," published in ''100 Years of Radio'', IEE Conference Publication 411, 1995.
* Coe, Douglas and Kreigh Collins (ills), ''Marconi, pioneer of radio'', New York, J. Messner, Inc., 1943. {{LCCN|43010048}}.
* Garratt, G.R.M., ''The early history of radio: from Faraday to Marconi'', London, Institution of Electrical Engineers in association with the Science Museum, History of technology series, 1994. {{ISBN|0-85296-845-0}} {{LCCN|94011611}}
* Geddes, Keith, ''Guglielmo Marconi, 1874–1937'', London : H.M.S.O., A Science Museum booklet, 1974. {{ISBN|0-11-290198-0}} {{LCCN|75329825}} (''ed''. Obtainable in the United States. from Pendragon House Inc., Palo Alto, California.)
* Hancock, Harry Edgar, ''Wireless at sea; the first fifty years: A history of the progress and development of marine wireless communications written to commemorate the jubilee of the Marconi International Marine Communication Company, Limited'', Chelmsford, Eng., Marconi International Marine Communication Co., 1950. LCCN 51040529 /L.
* Homer, Peter and O'Connor, Finbar, ''Marconi Wireless Radio Station: Malin Head from 1902,'' 2014.
* Hughes, Michael and Bosworth, Katherine, ''[https://www.worldcat.org/search?q=isbn%3A9781851243778 Titanic Calling : Wireless Communications During the Great Disaster]'', Oxford, WorldCat.org, 2012, {{ISBN|978-1-85124-377-8}}.
* Janniello, Maria Grace, Monteleone, Franco and Paoloni, Giovanni (eds) (1996), ''One hundred years of radio: From Marconi to the future of the telecommunications''. Catalogue of the extension, Venice, Italy: Marsilio.
* Jolly, W.P., ''Marconi'', 1972.
* Larson, Erik, ''Thunderstruck'', New York: Crown Publishers, 2006. {{ISBN|1-4000-8066-5}} A comparison of the lives of [[Hawley Harvey Crippen]] and Marconi. Crippen was a murderer whose Transatlantic escape was foiled by the new invention of shipboard radio.
* MacLeod, Mary K., ''Marconi: The Canada Years – 1902–1946'', Halifax, Nova Scotia: Nimbus Publishing Limited, 1992, {{ISBN|1551093308}}.
* [[:it:Giancarlo Masini|Masini, Giancarlo]], ''Guglielmo Marconi'', Turin: Turinese typographical-publishing union, 1975. {{LCCN|77472455}} (''ed''. Contains 32 tables outside of the text).
* Mason, H.B. (1908). ''Encyclopaedia of ships and shipping'', [https://books.google.com/books?id=0O5AEbIB51sC&pg=RA14-PA686 Wireless Telegraphy]. London: Shipping Encyclopaedia. 1908.
* Paul M. Hawkins – "Point to Point – A History of International Telecommunications During the Radio Years" {{ISBN|978-178719-6278}} pub. by New Generation Publishing.
* Paul M. Hawkins & Paul G. Reyland – "Marconi's Wireless Telegraph Stations in Essex – The Centenary of Brentwood and Ongar Radio Stations" {{ISBN|978-180369-3828}} by – pub. 2022 by New Generation Publishing.
* {{cite journal|last=Perry|first=Lawrence|year=1902|title=Commercial Wireless Telegraphy|journal=[[World's Work|The World's Work: A History of Our Time]]|volume=V|pages=3194–3201|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DoDNAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA3194|access-date=10 July 2009 }}
* Raboy, Marc. ''Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World'' (Oxford University Press, 2016) 872 pp. [http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=54659 online review].
* Stone, Ellery W., ''[https://archive.org/details/elementsradiote00stongoog Elements of Radiotelegraphy].''
* Weightman, Gavin, ''Signor Marconi's magic box: the most remarkable invention of the 19th century & the amateur inventor whose genius sparked a revolution'', 1st Da Capo Press ed., Cambridge, Massachusetts : Da Capo Press, 2003. {{ISBN|0-306-81275-4}}
* Winkler, Jonathan Reed. ''Nexus: Strategic Communications and American Security in World War I''. (Cambridge, MA: [[Harvard University Press]], 2008). Account of rivalry between Marconi's firm and the United States government during World War I.

== External links ==
{{external links|date=September 2024}}
{{wikiquote}}
{{commonscat}}
* {{Cite EB1922|wstitle=Marconi, Guglielmo|short=x}}
* {{Nobelprize}} including the Nobel Lecture, 11 December 1909 ''Wireless Telegraphic Communication''
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070416075629/http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/brevettomarconi.html Marconi il 5 marzo 1896, presenta a Londra la prima richiesta provvisoria di brevetto, col numero 5028 e col titolo "Miglioramenti nella telegrafia e relativi apparati"]}} (Great Britain and France between 1896 and 1924)
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070927002514/http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/brevettimarconi.html List of British and French patents (1896–1924)]}} The first patent application number 5028 of 5 March 1896 (Provisional deprivation)
* University of Oxford [http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/marconi/collection/ Introduction to the Online Catalogue of the Marconi Collection]
* University of Oxford [http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/online/modern/marconi/marconi.html Online Catalogue of the Marconi Archives]
* [http://www.fgm.it/ Guglielmo Marconi Foundation, Pontecchio Marconi, Bologna, Italy]
* Galileo Legacy Foundation: pictures of the Dedication of the Guglielmo Marconi Square, Johnston RI United States [http://www.galileolegacyfoundation.org/foto%20copia/NewEngland.html Dedication Photos]
* [http://www.arthurlloyd.co.uk/MarconiHouseStrandAldwychLondon.htm History of Marconi House], Marconi House, Strand / Aldwych, London.
* [https://wayback.archive-it.org/org-467/20200515080533/http://www.marconicalling.com/html/index.html MarconiCalling – The Life, Science and Achievements of Guglielmo Marconi], part of the Marconi Collection at the University of Oxford
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20070929092008/http://www.histori.ca/minutes/minute.do?id=10189 ''Canadian Heritage Minute'' featuring Marconi]
* [http://www.revver.com/video/176379/walter-cronkite-narrates-guglielmo-marconi-documentary/ Guglielmo Marconi documentary] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190709203454/http://www.revver.com/video/176379/walter-cronkite-narrates-guglielmo-marconi-documentary/|date=9 July 2019 }}, narrated by [[Walter Cronkite]]
* [http://www.techsoc.com/marconi.htm Review of ''Signor Marconi's Magic Box''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051105174358/http://techsoc.com/marconi.htm|date=5 November 2005 }}
* {{PM20|FID=pe/019406}}
* Robert (Bob) White, [http://www.best-breezes.squarespace.com/guglielmo-marconi/ Guglielmo Marconi – Aerial Assistance with a Kite]. Bridging the Atlantic By Wireless Signal – 12 December 1901. Kiting, ''The Journal of the American Kitefliers Association''. Vol. 23, Iss. 5 – Winter 2002 November 2001
* [http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/physicalscience/story/0,9836,616927,00.html ''Faking the Waves'', 1901]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20100813102744/http://www.carnetdevol.org/Wireless/radio.html Marconi and "wireless telegraphy" using kites]
* [http://www.zianet.com/sparks/sparkmakers2.html Sparks Telegraph Key Review] An exhaustive listing of wireless telegraph key manufacturers including photos of most Marconi keys
* [http://www.titanicinquiry.org/USInq/AmInq01Marconi01.php United States Senate Inquiry into the ''Titanic'' disaster – Testimony of Guglielmo Marconi]
* [[Public Broadcasting Service|PBS]]: [https://www.pbs.org/tesla/ll/ll_whoradio.html Marconi and Tesla: Who invented radio?]
* United States Supreme Court, ''[http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=320&invol=1 Marconi Wireless Telegraph co. of America v. United States]''. 320 U.S. 1. Nos. 369, 373. Argued 9–12 April 1943. Decided 21 June 1943
* 21st Century Books: Priority in the Invention of Radio – [http://www.tfcbooks.com/mall/more/431pir.htm Tesla vs. Marconi]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120406115016/http://maritime.elettra.co.uk/panfilo/ Information about Marconi and his yacht Elettra]
* {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20070225072715/http://www.radiomarconi.com/marconi/gm_diari.html I diari di laboratorio di Guglielmo Marconi]}} (The diaries of laboratory Guglielmo Marconi)
* {{usurped|1=[https://archive.today/20121216152741/http://www.radiomarconi.com/ Comitato Guglielmo Marconi International, Bologna, Italy]}} (Marconi's voice)
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120614035728/http://www.campevans.org/_CE/html/wa-1914-08-index.html August 1914 photo article on Marconi Belmar station in Wall, NJ], InfoAge. (See also, [https://web.archive.org/web/20141116020200/http://www.campevans.org/_CE/html/nrhp.html#Mar7-1 Marconi Period of Significance Historic Buildings.])
* [http://www.dcmemorials.com/index_indiv0001825.htm Marconi, Guglielmo: Statue north of Meridian Hill Park in Washington]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160803192334/http://www.dcmemorials.com/index_indiv0001825.htm|date=3 August 2016 }}, D.C. by [[Attilio Piccirilli]]
* [http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jbourj/money3.htm Guglielmo Marconi, 2000 Italian Lire (1990)]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090418122631/http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jbourj/money3.htm |date=18 April 2009 }}

{{S-start}}
{{s-aca}}
{{s-bef|before=[[Jan Smuts]]}}
{{s-ttl|title=[[Rector of the University of St Andrews]]|years=1934–1937}}
{{s-aft|after=[[Robert MacGregor Mitchell]]}}
{{s-end}}
{{Nobel Prize in Physics Laureates 1901-1925}}
{{1909 Nobel Prize winners}}
{{IEEE Medal of Honor Laureates 1917-1925}}
{{John Fritz Medal|state=collapsed}}
{{Telecommunications}}
{{Rectors of the University of St Andrews}}
{{Authority control}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2024}}
{{Use British English|date=February 2021}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Marconi, Guglielmo}}
[[Category:Guglielmo Marconi| ]]
[[Category:1874 births]]
[[Category:1937 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century Italian inventors]]
[[Category:20th-century Italian physicists]]
[[Category:Businesspeople from Bologna]]
[[Category:Converts to Roman Catholicism from Anglicanism]]
[[Category:Engineers from Bologna]]
[[Category:European amateur radio operators]] <!-- One of the 1st radio amateurs in Europe -->
[[Category:Italian experimental physicists]]
[[Category:Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences]]
[[Category:History of radio]]
[[Category:Honorary Knights Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order]]
[[Category:IEEE Medal of Honor recipients]]
[[Category:Italian Nobel laureates]]
[[Category:Italian Roman Catholics]]
[[Category:Italian electrical engineers]]
[[Category:Italian emigrants to the United States]]
[[Category:Italian expatriates in England]]
[[Category:Italian fascists]]
[[Category:Italian military personnel of World War I]]
[[Category:Italian people of Irish descent]]
[[Category:Italian people of Scottish descent]]
[[Category:John Fritz Medal recipients]]
[[Category:Members of the Grand Council of Fascism]]
[[Category:Members of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences]]
[[Category:Members of the Royal Academy of Italy]]
[[Category:Members of the Senate of the Kingdom of Italy]]
[[Category:Nobel laureates in Physics]]
[[Category:Nobility from Bologna]]
[[Category:Radio pioneers]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Matteucci Medal]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Order of Merit for Labour]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Order of St. Anna]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Order of the Crown (Italy)]]
[[Category:Rectors of the University of St Andrews]]
[[Category:Recipients of Franklin Medal]]
[[Category:International members of the American Philosophical Society]]