BRAINY BEAUTY: Ms. Hedy Lamarr

BRAINY BEAUTY: Ms. Hedy Lamarr

➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗➗

☑❎ Ms. Hedy Lamarr, who made her mark in Hollywood as an actress, also had a keen eye and interest for invention.

☑❎ Her patent with George Antheil shared below revolving around frequency hopping is estimated to have generated a market value of around $30 billion, but for most of her life, her creative and inventive ability was never recognized, financially and scientifically.

☑❎ When Ms. Lamarr shared her invention to Navy, the patent was not only discarded at that time. Moreover, instead of getting appreciation for her effort, she was asked to champion the sales of war bonds through her celebrity status. To add insult to injury, the invention was filed away due to its military applications, and was not commercially utilized until the year, 1962, when the patent already expired.

✔☑ By the way, do you know who used that patent commercially for the first time?
US Navy in 1962

🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽

Here is a gist of what happened, as shared in Physics World recently.

🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽🔽

"
Lamarr was told that if she really wanted to help the war effort, she ought to use her celebrity status to sell war bonds. Despite this being far from the technological help she wanted to provide, Lamarr ultimately sold some $343m worth of bonds. Even worse, the US government seized Lamarr’s patent in 1942 as the “property of an alien” as she was not a US citizen.

“I don’t understand. They use me for selling bonds, then I am not an alien. And when I invent something for this country I am an alien?” she says.

" -
Physics World, 2018

🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦🎦
https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201106/physicshistory.cfm

Comments