BOY WONDER
A new exhibit illuminates the teen who invented electronic TV
aMID A COLLECTION of some of the most rare and historic TVs i n the world at the MZTV Museum of Television (a ZoomerMedia property), Jonathan Moulton stands before a stout 1951 Capehart-Farnsworth model 325 playing footage of the moon landing on a loop. Its namesake, Philo T. Farnsworth, is the 24-year-old’s great-grandfather, a man whose name holds far less cultural cachet than Marilyn Monroe or Elvis Presley, whose respective televisions reside elsewhere in the space. And yet Farnsworth not only watched the moon landing live on that very set – he invented the technology that made the broadcast possible.
“Honestly, seeing this TV is probably my favourite part so far,” Moulton, decked out in his great-grandfather’s old tailcoat, says of the new interactive exhibit Forgotten Genius: The Boy Who Invented Electronic TV, curated by longtime television producer Phil Savenick and dedicated to bringing Farnsworth’s pioneering genius to light. “Because, for (him), seeing the moon landing was probably his favourite part about inventing television in the first place.”
Born in Utah in 1906, Farnsworth, a science-fiction fanatic, actually conceived of electronic television at the age of 14 while plowing his father’s potato fields, the crop lines inspiring his idea for how rows of electrons could transmit images through the air. He built crude television cameras and receivers and, by age 21, transmitted a straight line, the first electronic television broadcast.
Then, in what technically constitutes the first television plot twist, Savenick notes that Farnsworth refused to sell his patents to the RCA Corporation which, in turn, “sent their head scientist Vladimir Zworykin to Farnsworth’s lab under false pretences to steal the idea.” Farnsworth won the ensuing court battle over his patents, but the Second World War halted TV development completely. The patents expired by war’s end, allowing general access to the technology. Ironically, the man who invented the star-making medium became an obscure footnote in its history.
“It always seemed to me peculiar. We have the telephone, which is attributed to a single person – Alexander Graham Bell. We’ve got the airplane … attributed to two American brothers – that’s also not entirely true – but nobody knew anything about the people who invented TV,” Moses Znaimer, found- er and CEO of ZoomerMedia, says. “I thought that was outrageous.”
The exhibit, on now at Znaimer’s television museum, features biographical notes, photos, videos and artifacts, including a disc from Farnsworth’s plow, the first TV camera, his notepads and, of course, his TV playing the moon landing – the event that convinced Farnsworth that his struggles had been worth it. It also pays respect to the inventor’s wife, Elma (Pem) Gardner, who tirelessly aided him in his work.
“No one’s soared as high, no one fell as low as many times. And I just love that we’re finally able to pull him out of obscurity and say, ‘Wait a minute. This was special,’” says Savenick, who worked with Farnsworth’s family to bring the artifacts to light.
Farnsworth held 160 patents and invented everything from a nuclear fusion device to the baby incubator – many of which, Savenick adds, he gave away. In 2003, the Emmys instituted the Philo T. Farnsworth Award while Oscar-
winner Aaron Sorkin wrote the short-lived Broadway play The Farnsworth Invention in 2007 – which, Savenick notes in yet another plot twist, misrepresented elements of Farnsworth’s life and work and offered no royalties to the inventor’s family. By contrast, the aim of this exhibit is to resurrect Farnsworth’s legacy while using his story to inspire other young minds to pursue their own ideas.
Speaking of young minds, Moulton recalls how, in the second grade, his schoolmates wouldn’t believe that his great-grandfather invented television.
“I ended up bringing in some portion of one of the original TVs that he had built and (did) a whole presentation to the class,” he says, smiling and turning back to the footage of the moon landing. “At the end of it, they believed.” —MC