Gustave-Auguste Ferrié (19 November 1868 – 16 February 1932) was a French

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmi ...

pioneer and army general.Gustave-Auguste Ferrié
Encyclopaedia Britannica

Biography

Early years

Ferrié was born in Saint-Michel-de-Maurienne,

Savoie Savoie (; Arpitan: ''Savouè'' or ''Savouè-d'Avâl''; English: ''Savoy'' ) is a department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, Southeastern France. Located in the French Alps, its prefecture is Chambéry. In 2019, Savoie had a population ...

. After having studied in the southern city of

Draguignan Draguignan (; oc, Draguinhan) is a commune in the Var department in the administrative region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (formerly Provence), southeastern France. It is a sub-prefecture of the department and self-proclaimed "capital of ...

, receiving the Claude Gay Prize, and graduating from the

École Polytechnique École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...

in 1891, he became an officer in the French army's Engineers Corps, specialising in the military

telegraph Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas p ...

service. After being named to a committee exploring

wireless telegraphy Wireless telegraphy or radiotelegraphy is transmission of text messages by radio waves, analogous to electrical telegraphy using cables. Before about 1910, the term ''wireless telegraphy'' was also used for other experimental technologies for ...

between

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

and

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, in 1899 he carried out such communications in collaboration with Guglielmo Marconi. He exposed his works on 22 August 1900, when the International congress of electricity was organised in Paris. His works had the title : “''L'état actuel et les progrès de la télégraphie sans fil''” (''Current state and progress of wireless telegraphy''). In 1903 Ferrié invented a novel

electrolytic detector The electrolytic detector, or liquid barretter, was a type of detector (demodulator) used in early radio receivers. First used by Canadian radio researcher Reginald Fessenden in 1903, it was used until about 1913, after which it was superseded ...

, invented independently by Dr. Michael I. Pupin (1899), Professor Reginald A. Fessenden (1903), and W. Schloemilch (1903). That same year he also proposed setting aerials on the

Eiffel Tower The Eiffel Tower ( ; french: links=yes, tour Eiffel ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower. Locally nicknamed "' ...

for long-range radiotelegraphy. Under his direction a transmitter was set up in the tower, and its effective range increased from an initial to by 1908. He then developed mobile transmitters for military units.

World War I

Ferrié headed the French Radiotelegraphie Militaire before and during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, where in 1914 he led two linked advances in military radio communications : practical ground telegraphy made feasible by the adoption of

vacuum tube A vacuum tube, electron tube, valve (British usage), or tube (North America), is a device that controls electric current flow in a high vacuum between electrodes to which an electric potential difference has been applied. The type known as ...

s within radio receivers. The transmitter was a buzzer, and the receiver an

amplifier An amplifier, electronic amplifier or (informally) amp is an electronic device that can increase the magnitude of a signal (a time-varying voltage or current). It may increase the power significantly, or its main effect may be to boost t ...

with

triode A triode is an electronic amplifying vacuum tube (or ''valve'' in British English) consisting of three electrodes inside an evacuated glass envelope: a heated filament or cathode, a grid, and a plate (anode). Developed from Lee De Forest's ...

. By the end of the war the French had produced almost 10,000 such sets. Captain Paul Brenot headed the second group of Ferrié's Military Telegraphic Service. Members of the group included

Henri Abraham Henri Abraham (1868–1943) was a French physicist who made important contributions to the science of radio waves. He performed some of the first measurements of the propagation velocity of radio waves, helped develop France's first triode vacu ...

, Maurice de Broglie, Paul Laüt and

Lucien Lévy Lucien Lévy (11 March 1892 – 24 May 1965) was a French radio engineer and radio receiver manufacturer. He invented the superheterodyne method of amplifying radio signals, used in almost all AM radio receivers. His patent claim was at first disa ...

. Lévy was made head of the Eiffel Tower Military Radio Telegraphy laboratory in 1916.

Later career

Ferrié was made a General in 1919 and so remained until his death, having been exempted from retirement rules by a special law of 1930, and became general inspector of military telegraphy. Ferrié was named a Fellow of the

Institute of Radio Engineers The Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE) was a professional organization which existed from 1912 until December 31, 1962. On January 1, 1963, it merged with the American Institute of Electrical Engineers (AIEE) to form the Institute of Electrical ...

in 1917, and in 1931 received its Medal of Honour for "his pioneer work in the building of radio communication in France and in the world, his long continued leadership in the communication field, and his outstanding contributions to the organisation of international cooperation in radio." He received on honorary doctorate from

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...

in 1919, and in 1922 became a member of the French Academy of Sciences. He was the first president of the French National Committee of Geodesy and Géophysique (1920–1926), president of the International Scientific Radio Union (U.R.S.I.) and the International Commission on Longitudes by Radio, and vice president of the International Board of Scientific Unions. Ferrié was the president of the Société astronomique de France (SAF), the French astronomical society, from 1925–1927.de la Société astronomique de France'', November 1937, plates X-IX
/ref> In 1927, he received the Prix Jules Janssen, the highest award of SAF. Ferrié died on 16 February 1932, at the Val-du-Grâce military hospital in Paris. Several hours after his death he was awarded the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour. Today the Espace Ferrié (Musée des Transmissions) continues his memory in Cesson-Sévigné. A college named "collège Ferrié" is located in

and in the 10th arrondissement of

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

References

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