Haraden Pratt (July 18, 1891 – August 1, 1969) was a noted

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and

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pioneer. Pratt was born in

San Francisco, California San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

, where his parents were telegraph operators. He learned

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when young and worked briefly as a shipboard wireless operator before entering the

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(Class of 1914). After graduation, he joined the American Marconi Company and helped to install and operate its 300-kilowatt trans-Pacific radio station at

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, and its companion receiver station in

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. From 1915-1920 Pratt was a radio aide to the

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, leading its radio laboratory and engineering at

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. In this role he installed radio equipment on Navy ships and maintained West Coast shore stations until 1918, when he moved to

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, to take charge of the construction and maintenance of all high-power Navy radio stations. From 1920-1926 Pratt worked for the Federal Telegraph Company in

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish language, Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree kno ...

, where he designed a system for commercial radio telegraph service. When in 1926 the

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passed the Air Commerce Act to fund radio aids to air navigation, J. Howard Dellinger of the

National Bureau of Standards The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into physical sci ...

tapped Pratt and Harry Diamond to create a suitable radio beacon system in 1927-1928. In 1928 Pratt became chief engineer of the Mackay Radio and Telegraph Company, subsequently acquired by the

International Telephone and Telegraph Company ITT Inc., formerly ITT Corporation, is an American worldwide manufacturing company based in Stamford, Connecticut. The company produces specialty components for the aerospace, transportation, energy and industrial markets. ITT's three businesses ...

(ITT), where he eventually became vice president and general manager. During World War II, Pratt served as Division Chief in the

Office of Scientific Research and Development The Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) was an agency of the United States federal government created to coordinate scientific research for military purposes during World War II. Arrangements were made for its creation during May 1 ...

and was Chairman of the Radio Technical Planning Board 1945-1949, and in 1946 was an official observer of the

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atomic bomb tests. He remained with ITT until 1951 when he served from 1951 to 1953 as telecommunications advisor to Presidents Truman and Eisenhower. Pratt was vice president of the

American Cable and Radio Corporation American Cable and Radio Corporation was a communications holding company in the middle 20th century. Created in February 1940, it was a part of ITT World Communications, and operated what was known as the American Cable and Radio System, comprisi ...

from 1953 to 1958. Pratt joined 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 a ...

(IRE), became an IRE Director in 1935, served as president of the IRE in 1938, and was its secretary from 1943 to 1965. He was awarded the

IRE Medal of Honor The IEEE Medal of Honor is the highest recognition of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). It has been awarded since 1917, when its first recipient was Major Edwin H. Armstrong. It is given for an exceptional contribution ...

in 1944 "in recognition of his engineering contributions to the development of radio, of his work in the extension of communication facilities to distant lands, and of his constructive leadership in Institute affairs," and the Founder's Award in 1960. The IEEE Haraden Pratt Award was established in 1971 in his honor. His papers are archived at the Bancroft Library,

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

References

IEEE History Center biography

Haraden Pratt, Recipient, Medal of Honor, I944

Haraden Pratt Papers, 1908-1969
* J. H. Dellinger and Haraden Pratt, "Development of Radio Aids to Air Navigation," ''Proceedings of the Institute of Radio Engineers'', 16 (July 1928): pages 900-902. * Haraden Pratt and Harry Diamond, "Receiving Sets For Aircraft Beacon and Telephony," ''Bureau of Standards Journal of Research'' vol. 1, no. 4 (October 1928): page 549.

External links

*
Guide to the Haraden Pratt Papers
at

The Bancroft Library The Bancroft Library in the center of the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, is the university's primary special-collections library. It was acquired from its founder, Hubert Howe Bancroft, in 1905, with the proviso that it retai ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pratt, Haraden 1891 births 1969 deaths American electrical engineers Radio pioneers IEEE Medal of Honor recipients 20th-century American engineers 20th-century American inventors