FARNOVISION

"While the great minds of science, financed by the biggest companies in the world, wrestled with 19th century answers to a 20th century problem, PHILO T. FARNSWORTH, age 14, dreamed of trapping light in an empty jar and transmitting it, one line at a time, on a magnetically deflected beam of electrons."

You are looking at A VIDEO SCREEN. But do you have any idea at all who invented video?

It seems ironic. Inventors are such a big part of THE AMERICAN LEGACY. THE INFORMATION AGE began when SAMUEL B. MORSE tapped out "What hath God wrought?" on the first TELEGRAPH; THE MUSIC BUSINESS began when EDISON spoke the words, "Mary Had A Little Lamb" and heard them played back moments later from A TINFOIL DRUM. The TELEPHONE arrived when MR. BELL spilled some acid on his pants and shouted, "Mr. Watson, come here, I need you!" -- and Mr. Watson heard him on a contraption in another room. HOLLYWOOD began when EDISON filmed A SNEEZE.

TELEVISION, represents the culmination of all the inventions that went before it --the marriage of MOVIES and RADIO; sight and sound merged with THE ELECTROMAGNETIC SPECTRUM. The crowning achievement of AN AGE OF INVENTION.

But who among us can name the man who invented it?

VIDEO, in all its forms, is THE MOST PERVASIVE MEDIUM ever conceived. It's not just television, which is so omnipresent now that you can't even wait to board an airplane without being compelled to watch CNN or A SOAP OPERA. It's COMPUTERS, too, which are now turning into A MASS MEDIUM in their own right. And every computer in the world uses VIDEO as its PRIMARY DIPLAY DEVICE.

But how many of us whose lives are shaped by this device have any idea of the genius that conceived it?

THE CORPORATE DOCTRINE within the communications industry would have us believe that television was far too complex a concept to have been "invented" by a single individual working alone, in a garage perhaps, in the manner of EDISON and BELL (or HEWLETT & PACKARD and JOBS & WOZNIAK). They would rather us believe that the medium evolved over a period of time, finally emerging whole in the late 1940's from the great laboratories of THE INDUSTRIALIZED -- just in time for UNCLE MILTY, GUNSMOKE, and DINAH SHORE.

That television ever was an invention is a notion that seems to surprise most folks. It just seems like it's always been there, like GOD and McDONALD's. There is certainly no folklore associated with its origins. This void in our popular mythology is unfortunate, because in fact, the true origin of electronic video is one the most fascinating stories of the 20th century and features one of the era's most intriguing and enigmatic characters -- PHILO T. FARNSWORTH, The Boy Who Invented The Future.

Farnovision