Charles Jenkins Laboratories was founded in by

Charles Francis Jenkins Charles Francis Jenkins (August 22, 1867 – June 6, 1934) was an American engineer who was a pioneer of early cinema and one of the inventors of television, though he used mechanical rather than electronic technologies. His businesses incl ...

, developer of the

Phantoscope The Phantoscope was a film projection machine, a creation of Charles Francis Jenkins and Thomas Armat. In the early 1890, Jenkins began creating the projector. He later met Thomas Armat, who provided financial backing and assisted with necessary m ...

, the first commercial tv station

W3XK W3XK is widely regarded as the oldest television station in the United States. It was operated by Charles Jenkins of Charles Jenkins Laboratories from July 2, 1928 to 1934. It is believed to be the first station to broadcast to the general publi ...

and the first commercial

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

company.

History

in 1890 moved to Washington D.C. to work as an Steganographer, then he experimented with motion pictures and in 1890 developed a movie projector called the

, the laboratory was created years after it.

Transmission of Pictures over Wireless

In March 13, 1922 Charles Jenkins filed the U.S. patent No. 1,544,156 for Transmition of Pictures over Wireless, it was granted on June 30, 1925.

W3XK, the first commercial TV station in the US

In 1928 Charles Jenkins was granted the first commercial

license in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

and In July 2, 1928 Jenkins Television Corporation started to operate

, the first TV station. first aired from Jenkins Labs in Washington and from 1929 on from

Wheaton, Maryland Wheaton is a census-designated place in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States, situated north of Washington, D.C. and northwest of downtown Silver Spring. Wheaton takes its name from Frank Wheaton (1833–1903), a career officer in the Unit ...

, five nights a week. At first, the station could only send silhouette images due to its narrow

bandwidth Bandwidth commonly refers to: * Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range * Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...

, but that was soon rectified and real black-and-white images were transmitted.

Jenkins Television Corporation

In December 1928, Charles Jenkins founded in New Jersey the Jenkins Television Corporation to produce and manufacture Radiovisors. In March 1932, Jenkins Television Corporation was liquidated and its assets acquired by

Lee de Forest Lee de Forest (August 26, 1873 – June 30, 1961) was an American inventor and a fundamentally important early pioneer in electronics. He invented the first electronic device for controlling current flow; the three-element "Audion" triode va ...

Radio Corporation. Within months, the De Forest company went bankrupt and the assets were bought by

RCA The RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded as the Radio Corporation of America in 1919. It was initially a patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse, AT&T Corporation and United Fruit Comp ...

stopping all work on electromechanical television.

W2XCR

The Laboratories also operated experimental station

W2XCR W2XCR was founded in 1931 in Long Island City, New York by the radio station WGBS (now WINS). During the early part of 1931, but before the call letters were changed to WINS, the station began experimenting with mechanical television broadcasting ...

, it operated a

Jenkins mechanical scanner Jenkins may refer to: People * Jenkins (name), history of the surname * List of people with surname Jenkins * The Jenkins, country music group Places United States * Jenkins, Illinois * Jenkins, Kentucky * Jenkins, Minnesota * Jenkins, Misso ...

through the experimental transmitter, W2XCR. The station broadcast using both 48-line, 15 frame/s, and 60-line, 20 frame/s standards during 1931.

Closure

Charles Jenkins Laboratories closed after Mr. Jenkins died in 1934.

References

Defunct companies based in Maryland Television in the United States Defunct broadcasting companies of the United States {{US-bcast-stub