The son of a Protestant minister, Reginald A. Fessenden was born in East Bolton, Quebec, on October 6th, 1866.  A brilliant young student, Fessenden was fascinated by Alexander Graham Bell’s ideas of wireless telegraphy.  Fessenden became the first person to transmit a voice over a wireless telephone, which occurred outside Washington, D.C.  He also was the first to achieve two-way voice transmission using radio, sending signals from Scotland to Massachusetts.  Fessenden’s advances enabled submarines to communicate with each other wirelessly, and sonar techniques were first developed from his work.  Fessenden held more than 500 patents during his lifetime and in second only to Thomas Edison in terms of the number of patents held in one person’s name.

*posted October 3 - October 7, 2005