From Mary Bellis,
Your Guide to Inventors.
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Television was not invented by a single inventor, instead many people working together and alone over the years, contributed to the evolution of television.

1831-1900 1901-1927 1928-1950 1951-present

1831

Joseph Henry's and Michael Faraday's work with electromagnetism jumpstarts the era of electronic communication.

1862 First Still Image Transferred

Abbe Giovanna Caselli invents his Pantelegraph and becomes the first person to transmit a still image over wires.

1873

Scientists May and Smith experiment with selenium and light, this reveals the possibilty for inventors to transform images into electronic signals.

1876

Boston civil servant George Carey was thinking about complete television systems and in 1877 he put forward drawings for what he called a selenium camera that would allow people to see by electricity.

Eugen Goldstein coins the term "cathode rays" to describe the light emitted when an electric current was forced through a vacuum tube.

Late 1870s

Scientists and engineers like Paiva, Figuier, and Senlecq were suggesting alternative designs for Telectroscopes.

1880

Inventors Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison theorize about telephone devices that transmit image as well as sound.

Bell's Photophone used light to transmit sound and he wanted to advance his device for image sending.

George Carey builds a rudimentary system with light-sensitive cells.

1881

Sheldon Bidwell experiments with his Telephotography that was similiar to Bell's Photophone.

1884 18 Lines of Resolution

Paul Nipkow sends images over wires using a rotating metal disk technology calling it the electric telescope with 18 lines of resolution.

1900 And We Called It Television

At the World's Fair in Paris, the first International Congress of Electricity was held. That is where Russian Constantin Perskyi made the first known use of the word "television."