Marconi, the Italian hero?
As the inventor of the wireless telegraph, Guglielmo Marconi is often depicted as an Italian hero, while he actually was more focused on a large amount of international activities.
Born in Italy in 1874, Marconi lived in Great Britain for most of his life. One of Marconi’s greatest achievements was establishing wireless contact, at first between France and Great Britain, and later even between Europe and North America.
To commercially exploit his inventions, Marconi established several business ventures in Britain and the United States. He became one of the most influential entrepreneurial engineers of his time. The Italian government even appointed him to represent Italy during the Paris Peace Conference in 1919.
However, Marconi did not solely focus on the welfare of his own country. He believed that his invention would lead to peace in the world, because it would bring mutual understanding and create new societies, which transcended national borders.
Just like many other 'heroes', was the idea of Marconi being a ‘national hero’ constructed by the Italian government, so that the Italian state would be recognized as a strong contender in the European competition of nation states. So in the end, the idea of engineers as national heroes is a myth, mostly created by European governments.
How to cite this page
'Marconi, the Italian hero? ', Inventing Europe, http://www.inventingeurope.eu/story/marconi-the-italian-hero
Sources
- Trischler, Helmuth and Martin Kohlrausch, Building Europe on Expertise. Innovators, Organizers, Networkers, Basingstoke: Palgrave, forthcoming.
- Lommers, Suzanne. Europe - On Air : Interwar Projects for Radio Broadcasting. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2012.
