David Sarnoff

David Sarnoff (February 27, 1891 – December 12, 1971) was an American businessman and pioneer of American radio and television. Throughout most of his career, he led the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in various capacities from shortly after its founding in 1919 until his retirement in 1970.

He ruled over an ever-growing telecommunications and media empire that included both RCA and NBC, and became one of the largest companies in the world. Named a Reserve Brigadier General of the Signal Corps in 1945, Sarnoff thereafter was widely known as "The General."

Sarnoff is credited with ''Sarnoff's law'', which states that the value of a broadcast network is proportional to the number of viewers.

Early life and career

David Sarnoff was born to a Jewish family in Uzlyany, a small town in the Russian Empire, now part of Belarus, the son of Abraham Sarnoff and Leah Privin. Abraham emigrated to the United States and raised funds to bring the family. Sarnoff spent much of his early childhood in a cheder (or yeshiva) studying and memorizing the Torah. He emigrated with his mother and three brothers and one sister to New York City in 1900, where he helped support his family by selling newspapers before and after his classes at the Educational Alliance. In 1906 his father became incapacitated by tuberculosis, and at age 15 Sarnoff went to work to support the family.Museum of Broadcast Communications web site
/ref> He had planned to pursue a full-time career in the newspaper business, but a chance encounter led to a position as an office boy at the Commercial Cable Company. When his superior refused him leave for Rosh Hashanah, he joined the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America on September 30, 1906, and started a career of over in electronic communications.

Over the next , Sarnoff rose from office boy to commercial manager of the company, learning about the technology and the business of electronic communications on the job and in libraries. He also served at Marconi stations on ships and posts on Siasconset, Nantucket and the New York Wanamaker Department Store. In 1911, he installed and operated the wireless equipment on a ship hunting seals off Newfoundland and Labrador, and used the technology to relay the first remote medical diagnosis from the ship's doctor to a radio operator at Belle Isle with an infected tooth.

The following year, he led two other operators at the Wanamaker station in an effort to confirm the fate of the ''Titanic''.Radio Hall of Fame web site
/ref> Sarnoff later exaggerated his role as the sole hero who stayed by his telegraph key for three days to receive information on the ''Titanic''s survivors.Magoun, Alexande
"Pushing Technology: David Sarnoff and Wireless Communications"
paper presented at 2001 IEEE Conference on the History of Telecommunications Schwartz questions whether Sarnoff, who was a manager of the telegraphers by the time of the disaster, was working the key although that brushes aside concerns about corporate hierarchy. The event began on a Sunday, after all, when the store would have been closed.

Over the next two years Sarnoff earned promotions to chief inspector and contracts manager for a company whose revenues swelled after Congress passed legislation mandating continuous staffing of commercial shipboard radio stations. That same year Marconi won a patent suit that gave it the coastal stations of the United Wireless Telegraph Company. Sarnoff also demonstrated the first use of radio on a railroad line, the Lackawanna Railroad Company's link between Binghamton, New York, and Scranton, Pennsylvania; and permitted and observed Edwin Armstrong's demonstration of his regenerative receiver at the Marconi station at Belmar, New Jersey's hydrogen arc transmitter to demonstrate the broadcast of music from the New York Wanamaker station.

This demonstration and the AT&T demonstrations in 1915 of long-distance wireless telephony inspired the first of many memos to his superiors on applications of current and future radio technologies. Sometime late in 1915 or in 1916 he proposed to the company's president, Edward J. Nally, that the company develop a "radio music box" for the "amateur" market of radio enthusiasts. Nally deferred on the proposal because of the expanded volume of business during World War I. Throughout the war years, Sarnoff remained Marconi's Commercial Manager, including oversight of the company's factory in Roselle Park, New Jersey had a regular television service from 1936 onwards. However, World War II put a halt to a dynamic growth of the early television development stages.

World War II

At the onset of World War II, Sarnoff served on Eisenhower's communications staff, arranging expanded radio circuits for NBC to transmit news from the invasion of France in June 1944. In France, Sarnoff arranged for the restoration of the Radio France station in Paris that the Germans destroyed and oversaw the construction of a radio transmitter powerful enough to reach all of the allied forces in Europe, called Radio Free Europe. In recognition of his achievements, Sarnoff was decorated with the Legion of Merit on October 11, 1944.New York Times. October 12, 1944.

Thanks to his communications skills and support he received the Brigadier General's star in December 1945, and thereafter was known as "General Sarnoff." The star, which he proudly and frequently wore, was buried with him.

Sarnoff anticipated that post-war America would need an international radio voice explaining its policies and positions. In 1943, he tried to influence Secretary of State Cordell Hull to include radio broadcasting in post-war planning. In 1947, he lobbied Secretary of State George Marshall to expand the roles of Radio Free Europe and Voice of America. His concerns and proposed solutions were eventually seen as prescient.

Post-war expansion

After the war, monochrome TV production began in earnest. Color TV was the next major development, and NBC once again won the battle. CBS had their electro-mechanical color television system approved by the FCC on October 10, 1950, but Sarnoff filed an unsuccessful suit in the United States district court to suspend that ruling. Subsequently, he made an appeal to the Supreme Court which eventually upheld the FCC decision. Sarnoff's tenacity and determination to win the "Color War" pushed his engineers to perfect an all-electronic color television system that used a signal that could be received on existing monochrome sets that prevailed. CBS was now unable to take advantage of the color market, due to lack of manufacturing capability and color programming, a system that could not be seen on the millions of black and white receivers and sets that were triple the cost of monochrome sets. A few days after CBS had its color premiere on June 14, 1951, RCA demonstrated a fully functional all-electronic color TV system and became the leading manufacturer of color TV sets in the US.

CBS system color TV production was suspended in October 1951 for the duration of the Korean War. As more people bought monochrome sets, it was increasingly unlikely that CBS could achieve any success with its incompatible system. Few receivers were sold, and there were almost no color broadcasts, especially in prime time, when CBS could not run the risk of broadcasting a program which few could see. The NTSC was reformed and recommended a system virtually identical to RCA's in August 1952. On December 17, 1953 the FCC approved RCA's system as the new standard.

Later years

In 1955, Sarnoff received The Hundred Year Association of New York's Gold Medal Award "in recognition of outstanding contributions to the City of New York."

In 1959 Sarnoff was a member of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund panel to report on U.S. foreign policy. As a member of that panel and in a subsequent essay published in ''Life'' as part of its "The National Purpose" series, he was critical of the tentative stand being taken by the United States in fighting the political and psychological warfare being waged by Soviet-led international Communism against the West. He strongly advocated an aggressive, multi-faceted fight in the ideological and political realms with a determination to decisively win the Cold War.

Sarnoff retired in 1970, at the age of 79, and died the following year, aged 80. He is interred in a mausoleum featuring a stained-glass vacuum tube in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, New York.

After his death, Sarnoff left behind an estate estimated to be worth over $1 million. The majority of the estate went to his widow, Lizette Hermant Sarnoff, who received $300,000, personal and household effects in addition to the Sarnoff home, located on 44 East 71st Street.

Family life

On July 4, 1917, Sarnoff married Lizette Hermant, the daughter of a French-Jewish immigrant family who settled in the Bronx as one of his family's neighbors. The Museum of Broadcast Communications describes their 54-year marriage as the bedrock of his life. Lizette was often the first person to hear her husband's new ideas as radio and television became integral to American home life.

The couple had three sons. Eldest son Robert W. Sarnoff (1918–1997)Kleinfeld, N.R. "Robert Sarnoff, 78, RCA Chairman, Dies,"
''New York Times.'' February 24, 1997. succeeded his father at the helm of RCA in 1970. Robert's third wife was operatic soprano Anna Moffo. Edward Sarnoff, the middle child, headed Fleet Services of New York. Thomas W. Sarnoff, the youngest, was NBC's West Coast President.

Sarnoff was the maternal uncle of screenwriter Richard Baer. Sarnoff was credited with sparking Baer's interest in television. According to Baer's 2005 autobiography, Sarnoff called a vice president at NBC at 6 A.M. and ordered him to find Baer "a job by 9 o'clock" that same morning. The NBC vice president complied with Sarnoff's request.

David Sarnoff was initiated to the Scottish Rite Freemasonry in the Renovation Lodge No. 97, Albion, NY.

Honors

*In 1938, he received an honorary degree Doctor of Commercial Science from Oglethorpe University.
*He was an honorary member of Omicron Alpha Tau
*Knight of the Cross of Lorraine (France), 1951.
*Companion of the Resistance (France), 1951.
*Legion of Merit from the United States Army, 1944.
*Sarnoff was inducted into the Junior Achievement US Business Hall of Fame in 1975.
*Sarnoff was the winner of the National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame Distinguished Service Award in 1953.
*Sarnoff was posthumously inducted into the Television Hall of Fame in 1984.
*Sarnoff was posthumously inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 1989.
*Sarnoff was posthumously inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame in 2014.

Sarnoff museum

The David Sarnoff Library, a library and museum open to the public containing many historical items from David Sarnoff's life was in Princeton Junction, NJ. The David Sarnoff Radio Club composed of local amateur radio operators meets there, as does the New Jersey Antique Radio Club and other community organizations. The exhibits are in Roscoe L. West Hall at The College of New Jersey.

See also

* Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio
*Sarnoff Corporation, the eponymous successor organization to RCA Laboratories following the 1986 acquisition of RCA by General Electric.
*Metcalfe's law: the value of a communication network is proportional to the square of the number of users. By comparison, Sarnoff's law is linear.

References

Bibliography

* Camenzind, Hans "Much ado about almost nothing" He bequeathed it to us at his passing. http://www.historyofelectronics.com/Much-Ado-About-Almost-Nothing.pdf ''Note chapter 8, Armstrong- The real inventor of radio vs. a charlatan and a ruthless promoter, & Chapter 9, Farnsworth- A 15 year old Idaho farm boy invents television and battles the same ruthless promoter. RIP Hans Camenzind- he designed the 555 Timer chip.''
* Bilby, Kenneth. (1986). ''The General: David Sarnoff and the Rise of the Communications Industry.'' New York: Harper & Row. (cloth) – ''The best biography available, by a retired RCA vice president of public affairs.''
*Dreher, Carl Dreher. (1977). ''Sarnoff: An American Success,'' New York: New York Times Book Company. (cloth) – ''A thoughtful biography by an early associate of Sarnoff's.''
*Lewis, Tom. (1991). ''Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio.'' New York: HarperCollins (cloth) – ''Profiles Sarnoff's life along with those of Edwin Armstrong and Lee De Forest, drawing on archival sources.''
* Lyons, Eugene. (1966). ''David Sarnoff: A Biography.'' New York: Harper & Row. (cloth) – ''A cousin's sympathetic but insightful biography approved by Sarnoff.''
*Sarnoff, David. (1968). ''Looking Ahead: The Papers of David Sarnoff.'' New York: McGraw Hill. – ''A useful one-volume compendium of Sarnoff's writings, covering his views on innovation, broadcasting, monopoly rights and responsibilities, freedom, and future electronic innovations.''
* Schwartz, Evan I. (2002). ''The Last Lone Inventor: A Tale of Genius, Deceit, and the Birth of Television.'' New York: HarperCollins. (cloth)
* Sobel, Robert. (1984). ''RCA''. New York: Stein and Day. (cloth) – ''The most authoritative history on the company by a prolific business historian, with a thorough bibliography but no footnotes.''
*Gutterman, Leon. (1968). The Wisdom Society for the Advancement of Knowledge, Learning and Research in Education (1968) The Wisdom of Sarnoff and The World of RCA
* Woolley, Scott. (2016). ''The Network: The Battle for the Airwaves and the Birth of the Communications Age'' New York: Harper Collins.

Sources

"David Sarnoff of RCA Is Dead; Visionary Broadcast Pioneer; David Sarnoff of RCA, the Visionary Broadcasting Pioneer, Is Dead Here at 80,"
''New York Times.'' December 13, 1971.
*McLuhan