[NJARC] Fwd: ANN: Monmouth County as the Center of the Communications World

[Alex Magoun]

FYI,

Fine speaker, great subject (where's Camp Evans?)

Alex

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Subject: ANN: Monmouth County as the Center of the Communications World
To: H-NEW-JERSEY at h-net.msu.edu

From:    "Laura M. Poll" <lpoll at monmouthhistory.org>
Date:    Fri, June 21, 2013

As part of its Historically Speaking lecture series, Monmouth County
Historical Association is pleased to welcome Dr. Robert Lucky who will
give a talk entitled *Research and Development in Monmouth County; a
Storied Past and an Uncertain Future* on Sunday, June 23 from 2:00pm -
4:00pm.  The lecture will be held at the Middletown Arts Center at 36
Church Street, Middletown.

*Research and Development in Monmouth County*

In 1899 a young Guglielmo Marconi came to Atlantic Highlands to
demonstrate for the first time in America his newly-invented wireless
transmission apparatus.  The signals that he sent from the Twin Lights to
a ship in Sandy Hook Bay became an important landmark in the history of
communication.

Since that event, Monmouth County has been the site of a number of other
landmark discoveries and inventions in communications.  Karl Jansky
discovered radio astronomy in Holmdel at a time when this county was
considered to be "radio-quiet."  In later decades satellite communications
started here and the cellular network was conceived and designed.  The
faint radiation from the big bang that created the universe was first
heard at a horn antenna on the hill across from where the Garden State
Arts Center (now PNC Bank Center) would later be built.  About 20,000
people worked in research and development at Bell Labs and at Fort
Monmouth, which had responsibility for developing
communications and electronics for the US Army.

Dr. Lucky was one of the first people to move into the new Bell Labs
facility in Holmdel in early 1962.  He was a manager in the Labs during
what has been termed the "golden years" of about 1960 to 1980.  For a
number of years he headed the communications research division at the
Labs, and later he headed research at Bellcore and Telcordia. In recent
years he has had a unique position to consider the aftermath of the move
of Fort Monmouth as chairman of the authority for planning the
redevelopment.

Through the years Dr. Lucky has often been involved as an advisor to
0government, having been the chairman of the US Air Force Scientific
Advisory Board, a member of the Defense Science Board, chairman of the
Advisory Board at the Federal Communications Commission, and in other
advisory boards and committees at the Department of Energy, the Department
of Commerce, and at the Smithsonian.  His PhD is in electrical
engineering, he has received four honorary doctorates, and has won a
number of awards including the Marconi Prize and the Edison Medal of the
IEEE.  He has authored three books, and written a regular column in
Spectrum Magazine for the last 31 years.  He has been an invited speaker
at more than 100 different universities.

Dr. Lucky's lecture is open to the public and admission is free.
Refreshments will be served. Middletown Arts Center is accessible to
persons with disabilities.  If there are any special needs that require
accommodation, please contact the Association at 732-462-1466 within 24
hours of the presentation.

Monmouth County Historical Association is a private non-profit
organization that has been working to preserve history and provide
educational opportunities since its founding in 1898.  The Association's
Museum and Library is located at 70 Court Street, Freehold, New Jersey.
Museum hours are: Tuesday - Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.  The Library is
open Wednesday - Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.  For membership or admission
fees and further information, please call (732) 462-1466 or visit our web
site at www.monmouthhistory.org. /

Monmouth County Historical Association received an operating support grant
from the New Jersey Historical Commission, a division of the Department of
State.

--
Laura M. Poll
Librarian/Archivist
Monmouth County Historical Association
70 Court Street, Freehold, N.J. 07728
732-462-1466, ext. 16
lpoll at monmouthhistory.org
www.monmouthhistory.org

 --



-- 
Alexander B. Magoun, Ph.D.
Outreach Historian, IEEE History Center
39 Union Street, Rutgers University
New Brunswick, NJ 08901-8538 USA

+1 732-981-3414
www.ieeeghn.org
www.ieee.org/history_center