Television has a long history. While it is hard to pinpoint one person who invented TV, a number of individuals contributed to the invention of television. Each improved on technologies that were available to them and created various incarnations of the TV. Today, Americans have an average of three televisions per household.
1870 to 1880s
In 1873, Willoughby Smith discovered that the element selenium was photoconductive. In 1884, German engineering student Paul Gottlieb Nipkow invented the scanning disk and patented the first mechanical television system.
1900s
In 1907, Lee DeForest and Arthur Korn developed a practical design to amplification tube technology. In 1909, Georges Rignoux and A. Fournier demonstrated instantaneous transmissions using a rotating mirror-drum as a scanner and selenium cells as a receiver.
1911
Boris Rosing and Vladimir Kosma Zworykin, a pupil, invented a television system using a mechanical mirror-drum scanner for transmissions and electronic Braun tubes as receivers.
1920s
Zworykin invented two television systems, receiving patents for them in 1923. However, he was not the lone person credited for inventing the TV. Philo Farnsworth invented the image dissector, and in 1927, he demonstrated the possibility of transmitting electrical images using mechanical devices.
1930s
Both Zworykin and Farnsworth continued improving their inventions and both received patents. Their concurrent projects raised debates about who should be created as the man who invented the TV.
1939 World's Fair
At the 1939 World's Fair in New York City, television made its official debut with a presidential address by Franklin D. Roosevelt on April 30. The fair was televised on NBC.
1948
In 1948, Louis Parker received a patent for the first changeable television receiver.
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