What do Guglielmo Marconi, the Italian inventor who discovered wireless telegraphy, and Hawley Harvey Crippen, the diminutive American doctor accused of killing his wife in cold blood, have in common?
They were key players, albeit indirectly, in the first made-for-tv car chase, which contained neither tv's nor cars, but instead, wireless communication and transatlantic ocean liners.
In the summer of 1895, Marconi, who was trying to perfect the idea of wireless communication, moved his experiments outside his lab/attic and discovered he could transmit messages long distances using electromagnetic waves. From that success, he was able to seek out assistance from the British post office to fund further experiments.
In the year 1910, Dr. Crippen poisoned his wife in their London home and claimed she moved to California to cover up her disappearance. To escape the authorities that were closing in on what really happened, Crippen and his lover, Ethel Le Neve, altered their appearances and tried to escape to America via Canada on the SS Montrose.
Thanks to Marconi's wireless device, which was now installed on most ocean liners of the day, the captain of the Montrose was able to send messages, while en route on the open sea, that he suspected Dr. Crippen was a passenger on his ship. While he wined and dined the doctor into a false sense of security, people all over the world followed the chase through newspaper coverage fueled by regular updates sent via these magical wireless devices.
(Think of it as a slowly evolving OJ Simpson chase, only with a different verdict.)
When the Scotland Yard investigator chasing the doctor stepped on board to arrest him as the ship approached Canada, Crippen's fate was sealed. And with the arrest, and subsequent analysis of the crucial role Marconi's device played in the apprehension, the importance of instant communication was was forever set in stone.
Our world would never be the same.
