First public radio broadcast

The first ever public radio broadcast was transmitted from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, USA, on 13 January 1910. American inventor Lee de Forest had rigged microphones around the auditorium and connected these to a transmitter that could beam the evening’s entertainment – a rendition by tenor Enrico Caruso - around the city. Although the quality of the broadcast was questionable, it set the stage for the radio revolution. De Forest’s accomplishment was made possible by one of his inventions, known as the audion. This was a device that could amplify an electrical current. It could be used in a radio receiver to boost the tiny current produced in the antenna by a radio signal – so that the signal could then be fed to loudspeaker and heard.