600BC- Thales, discovered static electricity when feathers and other light objects were attracted to amber and silk being rubbed together. The Greek word for amber is elecktra
1600- William Gilbert, a British scientist and physician to, invented the term electricity. He was the first person to describe the earth's magnetic field and to realize the relationship between magnetism and electricity.
1752- Benjamin Franklin flew a kite with a metal tip into a thunderstorm to prove that lightning is a form of electricity.
1700s- The Wimshurst machine, a machine used to produce static electricity easily and reliably was invented. It functions by rotating two parallel plates in opposite directions, producing a charge around the edges of the plates.
1827- Georg Ohm, a German professor published his complete mathematical theory of electricity. The word Ohm later became the name of a unit of electrical resistance.
1831- Michael Faraday demonstrated electromagnetic induction by passing a magnet through a coil of wire. That same year, Charles Wheatstone and William Fothergill Cooke created the first telegraph machine.
1838- Samuel Morse invented Morse Code, a system of dots and dashes to communicate, which later became standard throughout the world.
1870s- Thomas Edison built a direct current electric generator in America. He later provided all of New York's electricity.
1876- Alexander Graham Bell, inventor of the telephone, used electricity to transmit speech for the first time.
1878- Joseph Swan, a British scientist, demonstrated the first electric light with a carbon filament lamp. A few months later, Thomas Edison made the same discovery in America.
1880s- Nikola Tesla developed an alternating current motor and a system of AC power generation. Edison saw Tesla's system as a threat to his DC supply and spread stories that it was not safe. It later gained acceptance.
1881- The first public electricity supply was generated in Godalming, Surrey using a waterwheel at a nearby mill.
1886- Heinrich Hertz produced and detected electric waves in the atmosphere.
1897- Guglielmo Marconi sends a radio message 20 miles away. Later he sends a message across the Atlantic.
1906 - Lee de Forest invents the vacuum tube.
1910 - The first commercial radios are sold
1918 - Edwin Armstrong develops a receiving circuit.
1919 - Radio Corporation of America (RCA) is formed.
1920 - Westinghouse Radio Station KDKA is established.
1929- Commercial ship-to-shore telephone service opened.
1933 - Edwin Armstrong demonstrates frequency modulation (FM).
1934 - Congress passes Communications Act of 1934, Federal Communications Commission founded.
1935 - First telephone call around the world.
1947- Opening of commercial telephone service for passengers on certain trains running between New York and Washington, D.C.
1954 - Sony introduces the first transistor radio that sold for $49.95.
