MARCONI, GUGLIELMO (1874- 1937). Inventor. Born Bologna, Italy, son of Giuseppe and Annie (Jameson) Marconi. Marconi was awarded the Nobel Prize tor physics in 1909 as a result of experiments in wireless telegraphy begun in the 1890s and culminating in 1901 with the reception of the first transatlantic transmission at Signal Hill, St. John's.

In the face of widespread skepticism, even in scientific circles, about wireless telegraphy, Marconi decided to attempt two-way wireless communication across the Atlantic from Poldhu, Cornwall to Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The experiment had to be of a ''genuinely fantastic proportion" he felt, if telegraphy were to capture the world's attention. When the Poldhu antenna became damaged and the Cape Cod antenna was destroyed in a storm, Marconi changed his North American location to St. John's because of its closeness to the weakened Poldhu transmitter.

Partly due to design in case the experiment failed, Marconi arrived in St. John's on December 6, 1901 with little or no fanfare, local newspapers referring to him as Mr. William Marconi. On December 9 Marconi began setting up a receiving station in an old military barracks on Signal Hill, then being used as a hospital. Several attempts at raising balloons and kites to elevate an aerial failed and St. John's residents were captivated by the sight of 14-foot diameter balloons being driven by strong winds across the sky. Eventually, around noon on Thursday December 12 and again the next day, signals were received from Cornwall.

He sought the Newfoundland government's permission to build the first North American wireless station at Cape Spear. However, the plan was blocked by the Anglo-American Telegraph Co., which had a monopoly on telegraph communications in Newfoundland. Residents throughout Newfoundland and especially in St. John's were furious. Marconi, unwilling to wait the two years for the monopoly to expire, accepted a Canadian government invitation to visit Ottawa, where he was given a grant to build the transatlantic terminal at Glace Bay, Nova Scotia. Another station was built at Clifton, Ireland, and in October 1907 commercial transatlantic communication— Marconi's dream—was inaugurated. In 1904 Newfoundland did receive a wireless station installed by Marconi himself at Cape Race, then under Canadian jurisdiction.

Marconi was to return to Newfoundland once more. He began to concentrate on wireless applications such as radio telephony, the transmission of the human voice. In 1920 he was back on Signal Hill, testing a long-range transmitter/receiver. The ship Victorian, dispatched from England in contact with a transmitter in Chelmsford, came in contact with the Signal Hill station about 1200 miles from St. John's on July 21 mand reception continued to improve until July 25 when perfect communication was received about 650 miles away.

Marconi continued perfecting his inventions and developing new wireless technology such as the shortwave transmitter/receiver and navigational direction finding equipment, as well as doing preliminary work on radar. He died in Italy on July 20, 1937.