Employed for 45 years by the General Electric Company as an electrical engineer, E.F.W. Alexanderson was involved in early research and development of radio-related technology. He is associated primarily with the development of alternators that first made reliable long-distance radio transmission possible.

Ernst Alexanderson was born in Uppsala, Sweden. After graduating from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm in 1900 and then studying electrical engineering for a year in Germany, Alexanderson emigrated to the United States. Shortly thereafter, in 1902, he found employment at General Electric. Alexanderson was involved in a number of projects during his first years at General Electric, until the work of Reginald Fessenden brought Alexanderson into radio research.

     Fessenden was attempting to achieve transoceanic voice transmission through a radio wave. Up to that time, radio transmission had been based on Guglielmo Marconi's spark­ gap system, which sent out an interrupted wave, thus creating a series of dots and dashes for Morse code. To achieve the ability to transmit a continuous wave on which a voice could be superimposed, Fessenden contracted with General Electric to construct a special alternating-current generator that could be used as the transmitter. This project was assigned to Alex­ anderson. After several years of design and development, in December 1906 the alternator was delivered to Fessenden, who proceeded that Christmas Eve to present the first radio voice transmission.

In the following years, Alexanderson continued to work on and refine the alternator for General Electric, incorporating many of his own engineering ideas into its design. This General Electric alternator was commonly called the Alexanderson alternator. The design of this large machine was very similar to that of a power plant's generator, though it rotated much faster. Such high-speed rotations created complex mechanical problems that Alexanderson had to solve.

     During World War I, the Alexanderson alternator began to receive much favorable attention in scientific and industrial circles when General Electric used it for transmission tests of a new vacuum tube the company had developed. Alexanderson was now concentrating on creating a 50,000-watt version of the alternator. By early 1915, developmental work on this device had reached the point where tentative plans were made to install one at an American Marconi radio transmitting station in New Brunswick, New Jersey, for field tests. While he was in the United States in T91 5, Marconi visited General Electric's Schenectady, New York, laboratory to examine the alternator. He saw it as a key component in developing reliable transoceanic communication. Shortly after Marconi's visit, representatives of Marconi and of General Electric discussed a deal whereby Marconi companies would have exclusive use of the Alexanderson alternator, with General Electric retaining exclusive manufacturing rights. The agreement was not completed because Marconi was suddenly called back to Europe by the Italian government.

     Although the negotiations with Marconi were on hold, General Electric proceeded with its plan to install a 50,000- watt alternator at the American Marconi New Brunswick site, and an alternator was delivered in 1917. Because of World War I, the U.S. Navy had been authorized to take over all high-powered radio transmission stations, and it soon took over American Marconi's New Brunswick facility. Using the call letters NFF, the navy used this alternator and a subsequent 200,000-watt alternator-also designed by Alexander­ son and delivered to New Brunswick-to transmit propaganda and information by radio throughout Europe. In January 1918, President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points message was delivered to Europe via this facility, as was a later appeal from Wilson to the German people to remove their Kaiser. For this latter message, Alexanderson himself was at the transmitter site.

     After the war ended, Marconi again approached General Electric with a proposal to obtain the exclusive right to buy the Alexanderson alternator, for by that time the alternator was the best long-distance transmitter available. If General Electric had accepted Marconi's proposal, a foreign company would have gained a monopoly over American radio communications with Europe. When General Electric approached the navy for its view of the proposed contract with Marconi, navy officials expressed strong opposition. Knowing that the government preferred an American company to control the country's international radio communications, General Electric instead bought a controlling interest in American Marconi, which led to the eventual formation of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) in 1919. Control over Alexanderson's alternator technology was one factor that led to the creation of RCA.

     Alexanderson was appointed RCA's first chief engineer. General Electric, as a founder and major shareholder of RCA, loaned Alexanderson to the new company while also keeping his services at General Electric on a shared-time basis. Alex­ Anderson stayed at RCA for four years and then returned full­ time to General Electric to continue research. He concentrated on antenna design and television research, demonstrating a mechanical scanning television receiver as early as 1927.

     Alexanderson retired from General Electric in 1948, but he stayed active for the next 27 years by consulting for several companies, including RCA. In these later years, Alexanderson was viewed in the scientific community as one of the pioneers of electrical engineering and early radio technology. He died in Schenectady, New York, in 1975, just two years after his final patent had been awarded.