[Ads-l] Antedating of "Radio"

[Shapiro, Fred]

radio (OED 1907)

According to Wikipedia:


The use of "radio" as a standalone word dates back to at least December 30, 1904, when instructions issued by the British Post Office for transmitting telegrams specified that "The word 'Radio'... is sent in the Service Instructions".[164]<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio#cite_note-earlyradiohistory.us-164>[167]<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio#cite_note-167> This practice was universally adopted, and the word "radio" introduced internationally, by the 1906 Berlin Radiotelegraphic Convention, which included a Service Regulation specifying that "Radiotelegrams shall show in the preamble that the service is 'Radio'".[164]<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio#cite_note-earlyradiohistory.us-164>

The switch to "radio" in place of "wireless" took place slowly and unevenly in the English-speaking world. Lee de Forest<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_de_Forest> helped popularize the new word in the United States—in early 1907 he founded the DeForest Radio Telephone Company, and his letter in the June 22, 1907 Electrical World about the need for legal restrictions warned that "Radio chaos will certainly be the result until such stringent regulation is enforced".[168]<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio#cite_note-168> The United States Navy would also play a role. Although its translation of the 1906 Berlin Convention used the terms "wireless telegraph" and "wireless telegram", by 1912 it began to promote the use of "radio" instead. The term started to become preferred by the general public in the 1920s with the introduction of broadcasting.

Fred Shapiro

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