Customer Reviews

The Boy Who Invented TV: The Story of Philo Farnsworth

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Philo Farnsworth was an inquisitive boy who had been interested in "anything mechanical" since he was a very small boy. Trains, telephones and phonographs were wondrous and magical inventions that excited and stirred his imagination. It was a passion that his father shared with him. He told his son about Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell and their inventions. When his father was temporarily away on a work assignment, Philo, at the tender age of eight, was left in charge of the family. Perhaps as a result, he grew more mature than others his age. Bullies had a tendency to tease him because of his unusual name, but he turned away from them.

He enjoyed reading his grandmother's Sears, Roebuck catalog and marveling over "cameras, alarm clocks, and machines that used a new, invisible source of power" called electricity. The most he got out of the catalog was a violin at the insistence of his grandmother, which tended to give more fodder for the bullies. There was something about this electricity business and the elusive "television" scientists were working on. Philo's mind never seemed to stop thinking about it. Wait . . . there was something about the plowed "rows of dirt" that turned a switch on in his fourteen-year-old mind. Was this the solution the scientists had been looking for to make pictures "fly through the air?"

This was a fascinating story of a young man who was nudged out and almost forgotten even though he invented "one of the greatest inventions of the twentieth century." I loved the way the story was told because it gave great insight into Philo's character and why he was not credited with his invention. The artwork was very "period" looking and quite appealing. The end papers are filled with a large variety of television sets that span the ages. This book is a Junior Library Guild Selection that both old and young alike will enjoy!

I had to read several biographies written for a young audience as part of an assignment for graduate school and came across this title. It was an interesting and riveting read, especially so considering I had never even heard of Philo Farnsworth!

This inspiring picture book biography recounts the true life story of Philo Taylor Farnsworth, who was just a 14-year-old farmboy in 1920 when he had a brainstorm. Seeing the plow create rows of overturned earth, Philo found a way to create television by "breaking down images into parallel lines of light, capturing them and transmitting them as electrons, then reassembling them for a viewer." His school teacher, Mr. Tolman encouraged him to go to college where he thought Philo's genius would be given the recognition it deserved. Unfortunately, events would conspire against Philo. He was forced to leave college after his father's death and became his family's main breadwinner.

It was only eight years after his brilliant idea first came to Philo's mind that he was able to realize his dream of transmitting the world's first television image. The book ends at this point though the author's note at the back of the book mentions how Philo triumphed in his bid to invent TV but would not get credit for it during his lifetime. Philo was embroiled in a dispute with the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) and never did get actual credit for inventing the television, especially since his patents expired and his ideas became public domain. It is an inspiring tale that will serve to fire young people's imaginations and motivate them to invent. Philo Farnsworth has finally received the acknowledgment and recognition denied to him all those years ago.

A young boy in Utah working as a farmer dreams of a miraculous invention and develops the idea as a very young man. RCA takes the credit and presents it at the 1936 World Fair. Wonderful children's biography and one that people will love. I'd never heard of Philo Farnsworth before. A best kept secret.

The Boy Who Invented TV: The Story of Philo Farnsworth by Kathleen Krull and illustrated by Greg Couch is yet another wonderful picture book about a young man having the courage to continue and solving science before anyone else! Farnsworth went through his daily life always wondering how the world worked. Philo Farnsworth, the young inventor, develops and then discovers how to transmit images electronically, while plowing the fields, which leads to the invention of the first TV. With the help of his wife, Philo gets his wife to be the first person on TV. The book is a wonderful book that shows courage of a young boy from a young age of three all the way up to a young married man, imagining, creating, and having the will to continue no matter how many people were negative and those who didn't have faith for him. This book is an encouraging book for young readers to continue on their determinations no matter how negative people can be.

A teenage plowing a potato field in 1920 had an idea of a way to 'make pictures fly through the air' - and eight years later he made his idea a reality and invented television. THE BOY WHO INVENTED TV: THE STORY OF PHILO FARNSWORTH offers large print and color drawings to explore the little-known story of Philo Farnsworth's childhood obsession with machines and electricity in a vivid guide perfect for young picturebook enthusiasts.