Andrew Alford (5 August 1904 – 25 January 1992) was an American
electrical engineer
Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...
and
inventor
An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...
.
Born in
Samara, Russia
Samara ( rus, Сама́ра, p=sɐˈmarə), known from 1935 to 1991 as Kuybyshev (; ), is the largest city and administrative centre of Samara Oblast. The city is located at the confluence of the Volga and the Samara rivers, with a population of ...
, Alford invented and developed antennas for radio navigation systems, now used for
VHF omnidirectional range
Very high frequency omnirange station (VOR) is a type of short-range radio navigation system for aircraft, enabling aircraft with a receiving unit to determine its position and stay on course by receiving radio signals transmitted by a network ...
and
instrument landing system
In aviation, the instrument landing system (ILS) is a precision radio navigation system that provides short-range guidance to aircraft to allow them to approach a runway at night or in bad weather. In its original form, it allows an aircraft to ...
s.
Alford graduated from the
University of California
The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Francisco, ...
in 1924. He received an honorary doctorate from
Ohio University
Ohio University is a Public university, public research university in Athens, Ohio. The first university chartered by an Act of Congress and the first to be chartered in Ohio, the university was chartered in 1787 by the Congress of the Confeder ...
in 1975.
*California Institute of Technology, 1927–28;
*Fox Film Corporation, 1929–31;
*Mackay Radio and Telegraph Company, 1934–41;
*Air Navigation Lab, International Telegraph Development Corporation, 1938–41;
*Harvard University Radio Research Lab from 1943 to 1945;
*Direction Finder and Antenna Division, ITT, from 1943 to 1945;
*Founded the
Alford Manufacturing Company.
He invented a balanced square antenna named the Alford Loop.
In 1965, the first Master FM Antenna system in the world designed to allow individual FM stations to broadcast simultaneously from one source was erected on the
Empire State Building
The Empire State Building is a 102-story Art Deco skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The building was designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon and built from 1930 to 1931. Its name is derived from "Empire State", the nickname of the st ...
. The original system was co-invented by Alford and
Frank Kear.
In 1983 Alford was inducted into the
National Inventors Hall of Fame
The National Inventors Hall of Fame (NIHF) is an American not-for-profit organization, founded in 1973, which recognizes individual engineers and inventors who hold a U.S. patent of significant technology. Besides the Hall of Fame, it also opera ...
for his invention of the
Localizer Antenna System which guides aircraft during landings.
See also
*
AN/MRN-1 The AN/MRN-1 was an instrument approach localizer used by the Army Air Force during and after World War II. It was standardized on 3 July 1942. It replaced the SCR-241, and was a component of SCS-51.
Use
The transmitter provides a signal to guide ...
US Patents
* Localizer Antenna System
{{DEFAULTSORT:Alford, Andrew
1904 births
1992 deaths
Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States
Inventors from the Russian Empire
American electrical engineers
UC Berkeley College of Engineering alumni
Harvard University staff
20th-century American engineers
20th-century American inventors