Radio Day (russian: День радио, ''Den' Radio''), Communications Workers' Day (as it is officially known in
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-ei ...
) or Radio and Television Day ( bg, Ден на радиото и телевизията, as it is known in
Bulgaria
Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedo ...
) is a commemoration of the development of
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 tr ...
in Russia. It takes place on 7 May, the day in 1895 on which
Alexander Stepanovich Popov
Alexander Stepanovich Popov (sometimes spelled Popoff; russian: Алекса́ндр Степа́нович Попо́в; – ) was a Russian physicist, who was one of the first persons to invent a radio receiving device. declassified 8 Janua ...
demonstrated a radio based lightning detector.
Origins
On 7 May 1895, Alexander Stepanovich Popov presented the paper "On the Relation of Metallic Powders to Electric Oscillations" before the Russian Physical and Chemical Society in St. Petersburg, which described his
radio wave
Radio waves are a type of electromagnetic radiation with the longest wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum, typically with frequencies of 300 gigahertz ( GHz) and below. At 300 GHz, the corresponding wavelength is 1 mm (sho ...
based device that used Sir
Oliver Lodge's coherer
The coherer was a primitive form of radio signal detector used in the first radio receivers during the wireless telegraphy era at the beginning of the 20th century. Its use in radio was based on the 1890 findings of French physicist Édouard Bran ...
as a
lightning
Lightning is a naturally occurring electrostatic discharge during which two electrically charged regions, both in the atmosphere or with one on the ground, temporarily neutralize themselves, causing the instantaneous release of an average ...
detector.
[Christopher H. Sterling, Encyclopedia of Radio, Routledge – 2003, page 1820] Popov's device was just a radio receiver, he would not develop a radio transmitter until over a year later (a year and a half after
Guglielmo Marconi
Guglielmo Giovanni Maria Marconi, 1st Marquis of Marconi (; 25 April 187420 July 1937) was an Italian inventor and electrical engineer, known for his creation of a practical radio wave-based wireless telegraph system. This led to Marconi ...
developed a similar device.
[ A picture of Popov's receiver appears on p. 207, fig. 12.2]
Popov's presentation was declared the "
inventor of radio
The invention of radio communication was preceded by many decades of establishing theoretical underpinnings, discovery and experimental investigation of radio waves, and engineering and technical developments related to their transmission and d ...
" in the former
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
and Eastern Europe (although historians note it may be more due to
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because t ...
era politics than historical evidence).
[Sungook Hong, Wireless: From Marconi's Black-box to the Audion, page 1] The first Radio Day was observed in the Soviet Union in 1945, on the 50th anniversary of Popov's experiment, and some four decades after his death. Radio Day is officially marked in Russia and Bulgaria.
See also
*
Telecommunications in Russia
Censorship and the issue of media freedom in Russia have been main themes since the era of the telegraph. Radio was a major new technology in the 1920s, when the Communists had recently come to power. Soviet authorities realized that the "ham" op ...
*
World Radio Day
World Radio Day (french: Le jour mondial de la radio) is an international day celebrated on 13 February each year. The Day was decided by UNESCO on 3 November 2011 during its 36th conference.
Background
Following a request from the Spanish Ra ...
References
{{reflist
External links
IEEE - Popov's Contribution to the Development of Wireless Communication, 1895BBC News - Russia: mother of invention?Calend.ru - День радио
(in Russian)
May observances
September observances
Observances in Russia
Public holidays in the Soviet Union
Telecommunications in Russia
Communications in the Soviet Union
Spring (season) events in Russia