[Ads-l] Slight Antedating of "Transistor"

[Shapiro, Fred]

The OED's first citation for the word _transistor_ is dated July 1, 1948.  Wikipedia refers to the following slightly earlier occurrence:

Transistor. This is an abbreviated combination of the words "transconductance<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transconductance>" or "transfer", and "varistor<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varistor>". The device logically belongs in the varistor family, and has the transconductance or transfer impedance of a device having gain, so that this combination is descriptive.
— Bell Telephone Laboratories — Technical Memorandum (May 28, 1948)<http://web.archive.org/web/20080528164454/http://users.arczip.com/rmcgarra2/namememo.gif>
Wikipedia links to an image of the technical memorandum quoted.

Fred Shapiro

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