News about George Antheil

Despite being one of the most important inventors of the 20th century, she lived her last days in solitude, far from the Hollywood glare, in a three-bedroom home in Casselberry, 20 minutes outside Orlando. Described as a recluse during her last years, Lamarr died at the age of 85 in January, 2000, never having been fully recognized for her invention that helped change the world. It was an unexpecting ending to a woman who defied every expectation of women at the time, helping to create the technology behind the telephone and wireless internet in an effort to help the allies during World War II .

Hedy Lamarr, an Austrian-born Jewish-American actress (seen left with co-star Victor Mature in 1949 film Samson and Delilah), left her domineering husband behind in the early 1930s and fled to London, where she was first recognized by the American chief of MGM studios in London. In what was to be a glittering career, the beauty, who had been married six times, emigrated to the United States and went on to star in films with Spencer Tracy, James Stewart, and Clark Gable. In response to the Nazis' repeated jamming of radio signals used to direct torpedoes to their targets in the Second World War, Lamarr helped devise the technology she became most famous for. She developed a system with composer and colleague George Antheil that made radio broadcasting more difficult to detect and enabled the missiles to reach their target. In 1941, the pair based the system on a piano's 88 keys and submitted a patent for the idea. A patent was issued the following year, but the US Navy decided against using the technology in combat.