An account of the origins and development of communications technology, identifying key innovators from the Victorian scientists and mathematicians to the engineers of the 21st century. It shows the impact of each innovation upon the modern world and looks to the future for innovations to come.

An account of the origins and development of the technology that has transformed telecommunications and broadcasting and created the Internet. It depicts this remarkable human achievement by identifying the key innovators whose ideas created today's world of communications, from the Victorian scientists and mathematicians to the engineers of the 21st century. It shows the impact of each innovation upon the modern world of communications technology, and looks to the future for innovations to come. The author was a principal player in the development of 20th-century telecommunications engineering.

Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgements
1: Introduction
2: Creators of the Mathematical and Scientific Foundations
3: The First Telegraph and Cable Engineers
4: The First Telephone Engineers
5: The Inventors of the Thermionic Valve
6: The Telegraph, Telephone Frequency-Division Multiplex Transmission Engineers
7: Pioneers of Radio Communication
8: Pioneers of Sound radio Broadcasting
9: Pioneers of Television Broadcasting
10: The Engineers of the Early Multi-channel Telephony Coaxial Cable Systems
11: The First Microwave Radio-Relay Engineers
12: The Inventors of the Transistor and the Microchip
13: The Creators of Information Theory, Pulse-code Modulation and Digital Techniques
14: The Pioneers of Electro-mechanical and Computer-controlled Electronic Exchange
15: The First Satellite Communication Engineers
16: Pioneers of Long-distance Waveguide Systems: An Unfulfilled Vision
17: Optical Fibre Communication Systems: The First Trans-Atlantic System
18: Inventors of the Visual Telecommunicatin Systems
19: Information Technology and Services
20: The History and Growth of the Internet
21: The Development of the Mobile Radio Service
22: Telecommunications and the Future
Name Index
Subject Index