also as the amplifier. It eliminates quite a bit of costly equipment in the talking motion picture. We are now making these tubes for use in sorting lemons, in sorting beans, and so many peculiar industrial applications that it is hard to remember that it grew out of television research.

Mr. DIENNER. Mr. Farnsworth, did you have any contact with foreign television corporations?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. We had, I think, in 1933 or '34 representatives from many foreign companies visit our laboratories. One in particular, the Fernseh interest in Germany, which is the combination of the Zeiss-Ikon and the German Bausch Co., became interested in our work on electronic television and took a license which resulted in an exchange of licenses and an exchange of technic between ourselves and those in various countries in Europe. The Baird Co. in London visited our laboratories and we arranged an exchange of licenses, patent licenses, and technic for use in the British Empire, and since then we have licensing arrangements in Australia, until now our patents and technic are employed throughout the world.

Mr. DIENNER. Is it a fact that the British and German television interests put the equipment on the market before it was done here in the United States?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. They have. They have made available to the public, equipment that is at the present time very satisfactory. The images transmitted are clear and large and show good definition and the receivers are very satisfactory. Program experimentation is making fine progress, and they have a television service which is in advance of that that we can boast of in the United States.

Mr. DIENNER. What is the explanation for their use of it before it was used here in the United States?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Their problems of application are vastly simpler than in the United States. In Great Britain two television stations can cover the country. In the United States perhaps the same service would be represented by a hundred or so; it would require a hundred or so stations. Then also, their way of paying for programs in both England and Germany makes available a certain amount of money for commercial application of television which must come in the United States from individuals, so that the service here is in more or less a position of lifting itself by its own bootstraps for awhile. We can't broadcast profitably without receivers and we can't go into any extensive receiver production without transmitters, and program research doesn't get very well under way without transmitters, and it is very much again the same problem of building a steam engine on a desert island without any other facilities. Fortunately that situation is, in pictures, being very rapidly changed now and television for the American home is going to be a service before very long. Also, this time hasn't been entirely lost. We have the benefit of foreign experience on problems of getting television started, so when television does emerge as a commercial service in the United States it will be, I think, a better service than is being made available abroad. The CHAIRMAN. The last figure which you gave as to the cost of your research was $60,000.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. That is the first 18 months.

The CHAIRMAN. What would you say this research has cost as a total?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. It has cost considerably in excess-I can't give you the exact figure, but considerably in excess of a million dollars. The CHAIRMAN. Ánd to raise that sum, it became necessary for you to bring larger and larger numbers of persons into the enterprise with you.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; it has been necessary not only for the original stockholders to put up money but for those of us who haven't had facilities to decrease the percentage of our holdings by bringing in anyone interested in helping us continue.

The CHAIRMAN. So that actually this is an illustration of cooperative research.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes. It has grown from the status of an individual inventor to that of a highly organized research and efficient research laboratory.

The CHAIRMAN. In other words, when this study is finally completed in any particular item along the road, it will be a group research. Mr. FARNSWORTH. A group research.

The CHAIRMAN. In which the credit will have to go, of course, the major part of it, to the original inventor.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Well, there I want to make it very clear that the inventor in a project of this kind can only be a small unit, that the successful financing of the venture, its continuation over such a long period of years, the patent counsel, the other legal counsel required, and the technical staff which must eventually be evolved are major items in carrying such a complicated art to completion.

The CHAIRMAN. In other words, your experience illustrates a fact which is becoming more and more apparent in the modern world, that advance of all kinds, technological advance and scientific advance and practical advance, is getting to be more and more the product of collective and cooperative effort.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; although we must not lose track of the fact that inventions as such, important inventions, are made by individuals and almost invariably by individuals with very limited

means.

The CHAIRMAN. You see, there is a concept abroad in the world that we are still living in the era of the rugged individualist, to use a phrase that has been more or less in common parlance for some time, but stories such as you are telling us this morning clearly demonstrate that that era is receding rapidly into the past and that we must find a way of working together if we are going to achieve really beneficial results for all.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; but do you see any difference in this development than in that of any other major invention?

The CHAIRMAN. Oh, yes; yes, I do; because to use a phrase that you used a little while ago, it is now necessary for the inventor to develop the tools to make the tools to make the tools to make the locomotive. So that you must have this cooperative effort, and there was a time when the inventor could make the monkey wrench and he made it and he didn't need any cooperative effort.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. But in technological inventions I doubt if the situation has changed much. Edison in his development of the electric light required facilities of the same order as are required in television. The telephone in its fundamental conception only required less facilities for its original adoption because scientific knowl

edge had not then advanced to a point where very much of anything in the way of a telephone could be evolved.

The CHAIRMAN. Of course Edison was breaking into this field where it was necessary to bring together cooperative effort and the knowledge of others, perhaps not to the extent that you had to do that, but I conceive Edison to be a figure in the modern world very different from Alexander Graham Bell, for example, who invented the original device on which the whole telephone system is based. I rather imagine that Bell didn't require, for the patenting of that device, anything like the cooperative effort that you have required to develop your idea, although the progressive improvements of his device require the sort of laboratory that was described here yesterday by Dr. Jewett.

Mr. DIENNER. I think our chairman has put his finger on the significant fact that although an invention starts with an individual and that individual must somehow arrange to make the tools to make the tools to reach the objective, the research laboratory is the human tool concept of the picture. The physical tools, the iron and steel tools, are only part of the picture. The human tools must also be applied, such as are available, and I think our brilliant chairman has caught the modern situation in this particular case history. Here is a man who has an idea. He must make the tools on the physical side and on the human side in order to develop the thing fully.

Mr. PATTERSON. Mr. Farnsworth, what is your title in the Farnsworth Television Corporation?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. I am vice president in charge of research. Mr. PATTERSON. How many patents, approximately, have you taken out?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. I think the number runs into around 46 at the present time, with probably twice that many applications entered. Mr. PATTERSON. Out of those 46, and applications pending, how many, approximately, are you the sole inventor of?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. I should say three-fourths of those.

Mr. PATTERSON. You began with this idea that you conceived a great many years ago, and you had no money. You borrowed money. I would like to ask you, are you still in control of your company?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. I am not in control of the company but I still own twice as much stock as any other stockholder, have twice as much interest in the company as any other stockholder.

Mr. PATTERSON. You are the largest stockholder?
Mr. FARNSWORTH. I am the largest stockholder.
(Representative Reece took the chair.)

The ACTING CHAIRMAN. I came in a little late, and for my information will you please state if you and your associates developed the principles upon which television is being worked out?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. The early principles of television I conceived in the period from 1922 to 1927 are the system now adopted, fundamentally at least, throughout the world, and while our company has in no way been completely responsible for the development, nevertheless the fundamental ideas underlying it were the entire basis for our early research.

The ACTING CHAIRMAN. There are now other companies in the United States who are working on television also?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; there are many, and there are many in other countries, but this basic idea of no moving parts is common to

124491-39-pt. 3—11

all systems, with the possible exception of one or two that are being used in the world.

The ACTING CHAIRMAN. Are there only a comparatively small group who are in your company, or has the stock been more or less open to the public?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. It has in no sense been open to the public. The diversification of the stock has come more through stockholders themselves trading around among themselves than it has been otherwise. The bulk of the money has been put up by very few stockholders.

The ACTING CHAIRMAN. So that the stock is mostly held within a comparatively small group of individuals.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. It is closely held and the majority of the stock is held by a very small group.

Mr. DIENNER. Mr. Farnsworth, I understand you developed a tube which produces radiation somewhat like radium. Is that correct?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. We have worked on a tube, the ultimate object of which is to produce very short radiation, very short X-rays, while not comparable with radium as yet but for the same purpose as radium, and also for producing very high velocity electrons.

Mr. DIENNER. That can be used for X-ray purposes, is that correct? Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; it can be used as an inexpensive source of very short X-rays, corresponding to tubes of 1 to 5 to 10 million volts. Mr. DIENNER. Going back to an earlier statement, you explained that the television of your conception involved no moving parts, no parts which had inertia. Will you please explain briefly what the difference is between having moving parts and having merely electron movement in terms of satisfactory operation?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. It comes down to the nature in which television must be accomplished, that is, the picture must be made up of points in a plane, the points having varying intensities, and the picture must be broken down and transmitted one point at a time. Then a complete picture must be transmitted in a comparatively short fraction of time, say, 30 times per second, 30 images per second, so that if we break down the picture into half a million units and transmit those 30 times per second, we have some 15,000,000 points of light per second which must be transmitted.

Not only that, but the tearing down process at the transmitter and the building up process at the receiver, while occurring at this enormous rate, must be synchronized so that the receiver and transmitter are doing the same thing at the same time, and that tremendously high speed of transmission is practically synonymous, it has been in my mind, with the lack of mechanical movement. So that in our system the fundamental idea is to translate an optical image into an electronic discharge corresponding to that image, because the electronic image can be deflected and moved and operated on almost without any inertial effects, without any mechanical lag, and makes possible this tremendously high rate of information transfer without involving too complicated apparatus.

APPLICATION FOR PATENT COVERING BASIC IDEA OF FARNSWORTH

TELEVISION

Mr. DIENNER. And I understand that the patents and patent applications which you filed covered that concept and its application to television.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; the early application that was filed in the early part of 1927 covered the basic idea-it covered two basic ideas, conversion of the optical image into an electronic image and the scanning of that image in a linear fashion, much as a sheet of paper is typewritten that is the generation of electrical impulses which transmit the image in a proper, orderly fashion.

Mr. DIENNER. Now in the course of your securing patent protection, did you encounter any interferences with other inventors?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; we have been involved in many interferences, the exact number I don't know, but since 1927 there has been to the best of my knowledge no time when we haven't been involved in interferences.

Mr. DIENNER. Approximately how many would you say?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. I should say 20 or 25 in all.

Mr. DIENNER. And some of those are still active?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; there are some of the interferences that are still active.

Mr. DIENNER. Tell us about what the first contested interference cost you and your backers?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. One of our interferences, I think it was the second one, cost the company approximately $35,000, somewhat of that order, perhaps more and perhaps slightly less, but it was very close to $35,000.

Mr. DIENNER. Did you win it?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. We won that interference; yes.

Mr. DIENNER. And you had further interferences beyond that? Mr. FARNSWORTH. Yes; we have had, as I say, continual interferences in other matters.

The ACTING CHAIRMAN. If I may ask, do any of these interferences involve the fundamental principles of your idea?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. The interference to which I referred as costing $35,000 involved the basic idea of converting an optical image into an electrical image and forming a train of television signals to correspond to the electrical image.

The ACTING CHAIRMAN. And that has been cleared up?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. It has been cleared up.

Mr. PATTERSON. When was the first public demonstration of electronic television?

Mr. FARNSWORTH. The first public demonstration was at the Franklin Institute in 1934. That demonstration lasted about 2 weeks, at which time we televised all kinds of scenes from outdoor pictures to pick-up of the parkway in Philadelphia, the transmission of night club scenes-in fact, we generally raised hob with the dignity of the Franklin Institute for a period of 10 days.

Mr. PATTERSON. You are talking about the Farnsworth Television Corporation.

Mr. FARNSWORTH. This was the Farnsworth television demonstration.

Mr. DIENNER. Have you been involved in any litigation in regard to the patents, I mean suits on patents aside from the interferences? Mr. FARNSWORTH. Not aside from the interferences.

Mr. DIENNER. The money which was put into that first contest that cost you $35,000 had to come out of your backing and not out of earnings, is that correct?