World Radio Day

Today is World Radio Day!

This day is about celebrating the medium of radio. Even in the era of the Internet, radio has found ways to adapt, whether it's for news or entertainment. 

While the idea of radio frequencies was a very old one (Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell first theorized the electromagnetic spectrum, including radio waves in his equations, which he had been working on since 1856, as well as his 1865 paper), it would be German physicist Heinrich Hertz who truly proved the existence of the radio wave as we think of it. In fact, the measuring unit of frequency, the hertz (Hz), is named in his honor.

(The more you know)

Building on the work and studies of other physicists, the Italian electrical engineer and politician Guglielmo Marconi created the first radio transmission system in the summer of 1895. By 1901, he had improved his system to the point that it was able to transmit messages from the United Kingdom to Canada. It's why he's considered the inventor of radio, or the "father of radio". More appropriately in his native tongue, he'd be called "Il padre della radio".

From there, it would spread throughout the world. For a while, it was one of the premiere entertainment mediums before the advent and popularization of television. 1919 saw the first American radio station started to broadcast out of Pittsburgh, and 1939 saw the birth of FM radio. Despite that and even the rise of the Internet, radio persisted. In 1994, radio went digital with the start of Internet streaming.

In 2011, UNESCO proclaimed this day as World Radio Day as it was on this day in 1946 that the United Nations broadcasting service was launched. 

Yup, radio has had a long and fascinating history. Tune in and listen to some today! Thanks for reading this blog entry! If you liked it, show it off! Take care of yourselves and each other! See you next time!