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ANSI Reporter Special Feature CONTENTS www.ansi.org/reporter Publisher American National Standards Institute ANSI SENIOR STAFF President & CEO Dr. Mark W. Hurwitz, CAE [email protected] Senior Vice President and Frances Schrotter Chief Operating Officer [email protected] On the Cover Vice President Bob Feghali Gateway Arch Business Development & [email protected] Chief Information Officer St. Louis, Missouri, USA Vice President Lane Hallenbeck Photo: Stock by Photodisc Green Conformity Assessment [email protected] at www.gettyone.com Vice President Peggy Jensen Finance and Administration [email protected] Vice President David Karmol n 1904, leading scientists and pioneering industrialists from around the Public Policy and [email protected] Government Relations globe gathered at the Coliseum Music Hall in St. Louis, Missouri, to discuss Vice President John Kalemkerian, CAE the need for cooperation leading to the standardization of electrical appara- Membership, Communications [email protected] I and Education tus and machinery. This pivotal meeting ultimately led to the establishment of Vice President Gary Kushnier the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in 1906. One year later, in International Policy [email protected] 1907, U.S. interests rallied to form a National Committee (the U.S. National Vice President Amy Marasco and General Counsel [email protected] Committee of the IEC, or “USNC”) to oversee the country’s participation in IEC activities. Today, the IEC promotes international cooperation on all ANSI REPORTER STAFF questions of standardization and the verification of conformity to standards in Editor and Stacy M. Leistner the fields of electricity, electronics and related technologies. Art Director [email protected] Lead Writer Sarah C. McCreary [email protected] In recognition of 100 years of global standardization efforts in the electrotech- Production Stephanie Carroll nical industry, and in remembrance of the historic meeting in St. Louis, [email protected] Tricia Power Missouri, on September 22, 2004, the American National Standards Institute [email protected] and its USNC proudly present this collection of commemorative articles to USNC STAFF begin the IEC 2004 Centenary Celebration. Program Director and Charlie Zegers Secretary-General, USNC [email protected] Kevin Sullivan [email protected] Hilary Zerbst [email protected] The articles in this commemorative tribute were commissioned by and are reprinted with the permission of the International Electrotechnical AMERICAN NATIONAL STANDARDS INSTITUTE Commission (IEC). Headquarters 1819 L Street, NW, Sixth Floor, Washington, DC 20036 Telephone: 202.293.8020; Fax: 202.293.9287 03 The World of Electricity: 1820-1904 Operations by Mark Frary, with input by Paul Tunbridge 25 West 43rd Street, New York, NY 10036 Telephone: 212.642.4900; Fax: 212.398.0023 The ANSI Reporter (ISSN 0038-9676) is published quarterly. 06 The Appointment of a Representative Commission Members of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) receive by Jeanne Erdmann free subscriptions and online access (www.ansi.org/reporter). Paid subscriptions are available for non-members at an annual rate of $100. Requests for permission to reprint should be sent to Editor, ANSI 09 The Founding of the IEC Reporter, c/o ANSI Communications and Public Relations Department. by Mark Frary Bylined articles and Letters to the Editor are encouraged. Submissions are published at ANSI’s discretion and are subject to editing for space and clarity. Viewpoints expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or the policies of the American National Standards Institute. All submissions are non-returnable. Please include a daytime phone number. © 2004 ANSI Reporter American National Standards Institute 2 Q ANSI REPORTER a commemorative tribute called the “evolution of electricity from mag- netism.” Faraday made minute and accurate measurements of electric forces. He also conducted numerous experiments through a process of magnetization and demagnetization, 1820-1904 for which two separate insulated coils wound round an iron ring enabled him to successfully HE ORLD OF LECTRICITY demonstrate the complex phenomena of induc- T W E tion. This discovery was later to pave the way for the development of electric generators and alternators. Faraday’s experimental disk gener- ator became the first to produce a continuous electric current. In a series of or much of the 19th century, the industrial revolution was papers between 1855 in full swing, with electricity being harnessed for commercial and 1873, the theoreti- cal physicist James purposes for the first time. This was a period of great Clerk Maxwell used F the mathematics of industry and inventiveness. Author Mark Frary, with contributions incompressible fluids provided by Paul Tunbridge, introduces many of the theoreticians and to express Faraday’s inventors that laid the foundation for the electrical world that exists today. lines of force, estab- lishing his famous series of equations and speculating that elec- tromagnetism bore a remarkable resemblance to the properties of light. At the time, Maxwell Following Alessandro Volta’s experiments in current. When the demonstration was repeated said: “We can scarcely avoid the conclusion 1800, which produced electricity by the mutual by Professor de la Rive at the Académie des that light consists in the transverse undulations contact of discs of silver and zinc moistened sciences in Paris, among those present was the of the same medium which is the cause of with water, the study of electric current distinguished mathematician André-Marie electric and magnetic phenomena.” changed the direction of 19th century physics. Ampère who began a series of researches on However, Maxwell who died in 1879, In their search to find a continuous source of the phenomenon. Meanwhile, Georg Simon did not live to see the experimental proof power, inventors in various parts of the world Ohm, a Bavarian physicist, established in 1827 of his theory. This was left to Heinrich Hertz. designed larger batteries but, as today, were the important relationship that the current Between 1885 and 1889, Hertz was a profes- defeated by the cost question. Mathematicians through a circuit is proportional to the applied sor at Karlsrühe Polytechnic in Germany and physicists were engaged in a race to electric and magnetic fields and inversely and carried out experiments in which he unravel the intimate relationship between proportional to the resistance. discharged a condenser across a spark gap, electricity and magnetism. At the same time, The English chemist Sir Humphrey creating radio waves that were then detected inventors and engineers were trying to outdo Davey, working to improve the safety of by means of a resonator with a similar gap. each other with ingenious and ever more miners who relied on candles, had produced This was the first successful transmission and efficient devices and systems to produce, in 1802 the first electric arc lamp in which reception of radio waves and Hertz was able measure and harness it. electricity was to measure their wavelength and frequency. discharged between He subsequently showed that radio waves The “theoreticians” two pieces of carbon. were reflected and refracted in the same way he theoretical basis for understand- His laboratory assis- as light. ing electricity began in the 1800s. tant was Michael Sir Charles Wheatstone, an English T In 1820 a Danish physicist, H.C. Faraday, who in physicist and inventor, was professor of Oersted, demonstrated that a current passing 1831, while Director experimental philosophy at King’s College through a wire would deflect a compass of the Laboratory of London. While in Heidelberg, Germany, needle. This experiment enabled him to the Royal Institution, studying anatomy, he attended a lecture in discover the magnetic effect of an electric investigated what he 1836 during which (continued on page 4) a commemorative tribute ANSI REPORTER 3 The World of Electricity: 1820-1904 (continued from page 3) Professor Müncke calculate and reduce power losses in motors, Guglielmo demonstrated a single-needle telegraph. generators and transformers. Steinmetz went Marconi was born Impressed, Wheatstone designed the first on to show how complex number theory could in Bologna, Italy, in commercially acceptable installation which be used as an elegant means of predicting the 1874. By 1896, he two years later went into operation in England behavior of alternating currents in circuits. had come to England on the Great Western Railway. He also and was helped in designed a workable ABC printing telegraph, The inventors his experiments in which eventually failed to find a suitable hile the first half of the century wireless telegraphy market. In 1843 Wheatstone experimented belonged to the “theoreticians,” by William Preece, with underwater telegraphy, but this model W the second half was a period of the engineer-in-chief lacked the appropriate insulation for the creativity in science and engineering. Important of the Post Office. In a letter to Preece in conducting wires. Almost simultaneously, inventors from this era included Thomas November of that year Marconi remarked that in the United States, Samuel Morse was con- Edison, Nikola Tesla, Guglielmo Marconi “this very rapid charging and discharging of ducting similar experiments and successfully and Colonel R. E. B. Crompton. the capacity throws the ether all around into operated a public service between Baltimore In the United States, Thomas
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