History of RadioRadio has evolved over time. The radio we listen to today has a different format, purpose, audience reach, and clarity than before the 1950s. Radio has survived the threat of the television industry by changing with the times. It has been addressed by law through Acts and the creation of the Government Regulatory Agency (FCC). Today, radio is the cheapest and most affective way to communicate with everyone around the world. It all began with Samuel Morse's invention of the telegraph in 1844 and developed as the skilled minds of inventors and engineers worked from the late 1800s to the present to create the powerful means of communication we know today as radio. Radio was developed through the collaboration of many inventions and ideas coming from the minds of experts in scientific fields. As early as 1844, messages were transmitted from person to person via the telegraph, invented by Samuel Morse (Vivian 252). By 1861 messages could be sent from coast to coast, and only five years later did cables beneath the ocean floor allow for transatlantic communications. This development was still just point-to-point voiceless communication, but it set the stage for future thinkers to expand on it (Campbell 113). In 1860 James Clerk Maxwell theorized the existence of electromagnetic waves. His theories were proven by Heinrich Hertz in 1887. The name Hertz was adapted to the measurement of radio frequencies (Keith 2). All the inventions and theories of these men led to the wireless technology of radio. Until 1901 the ability to communicate was only possible from earth to earth via cables. It was necessary to create a method for ships to communicate with each other and land for their own safety. It was the Italian engineer Guglielmo Marconi who made communication through space possible, giving rise to Hertz's discoveries (Ditingo 15). Wireless communication, or radio, was a big step forward, but there was still a desire for one-to-many communication. The next step in the development of radio was to allow many listeners of a single sender (voice and music) to pass across the airwaves. Lee De Forest took an interest in the progress of his predecessors. He patented over 300 inventions, one of the most important being the thermionic valve. It detected and amplified radio signals. His work was “essential… at the heart of the paper… ications of financing. Since then the radio has been dependent on donations, which has put them back in the position of worrying about criticizing their supporters (Campbell141-142). Twenty-first century radio has changed considerably since the first broadcasts of the 1920s. He had to face the threat of television and monopolies. It has grown as a business, entertainment, technology and communication medium. Although it has changed, it still serves as a mass medium through which millions of people in the United States and around the world obtain and provide information and, most commonly, entertainment. Works Cited Campbell, Richard. Media and culture: an introduction to mass communication. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2002.Ditingo, Vincent M. Remaking Radio. Boston, Focal Press, 1995. Keith, Michael C., and Joseph M. Krause. The radio station. Boston, Focal Press, 1986. Smulyan, Susan. Selling Radios: The Marketing of American Broadcasting 1920-1934. London: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994. Soley, Lawrence. Free radio. Boulder Colorado: Westview Press, 1999. Vivian, John. The mass media. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1997.