The Invention of the ‘Jewish Inventor’ Hedy Lamarr

Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler – better known as Hedy Lamarr – has become a feminist icon over the last decade on the strength of the contention that she was both a supermodel, Hollywood actress and notable inventor. I’ve dealt with claims that Lamarr invented Frequency-hopping Spread Spectrum Technology (1) as well as Wi-Fi (2) in separate articles.

The primary basis for this mythologizing of Lamarr is the claim that she invented Frequency-hopping Spread Spectrum Technology in the form of the ‘Secret Communication System’ for stopping torpedoes being jammed in 1941 which is alleged (wrongly) to be ‘the basis’ of Wi-Fi without qualification that Lamarr didn’t invent Frequency-hopping Spread Spectrum Technology (rather Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 1899 came up with it (3) and Polish engineer Leonard Danilewicz first applied it practically), (4) but also the 1942 patent (applied for in 1941) listed a co-creator George Antheil.

The problem you see is that that in feminists promoting Lamarr as some ‘great inventor’ we completely lose sight of the historical record and instead veer off into the realms of abject fantasy precisely because even feminists who should know better – like Muriel Médard of MIT – (5) are hesitant to talk about who Antheil was or the circumstances of ‘joint invention’ of the ‘Secret Communication System’.

This is because while they are content to label Antheil as a ‘composer’ and ‘musician’ they don’t want to talk about the fact that Antheil wasn’t an ordinary composer or musician in that he was also a mechanical whiz-kid, who created mechanical-electrical machines to make music (for example his ‘noisemakers’ for the 1924 French film ‘Ballet Mécanique’) which even the pro-Lamarr documentary ‘Bombshell’ suggests were the key and the inspiration behind the ‘Secret Communication System’ patent as Antheil had already used ‘Frequency hopping’ in his ‘noisemakers’ for ‘Ballet Mécanique’). (6)

They are also not keen to talk about just why Lamarr asked Antheil to come to her (marital) home in 1940 which was the meeting that produced the ‘Secret Communication Technology’: Lamarr wanted to talk to Antheil about how to augment her breasts (Antheil having written an article in ‘Esquire’ on the subject as well as a book ‘Every Man His Own Detective: A Study of Glandular Criminology’ appreciating women’s breasts in 1937) (7) and by her own account they ‘sat on her living room rug’ and claimed it was ‘more fun’ than ‘watching movies’. (8)

The implication that Antheil – a noted Hollywood playboy – and Lamarr – who was apparently easy to get into bed – were having sex on said ‘living room rug’ is obvious and Brandon Baum agrees (by implication) this seems to be what Lamarr is describing in her 1945 interview published in ‘The Stars and Stripes’. (9)

However, the same interview gives us rather more information than just the implication Antheil and Lamarr were having sex as part of an extra-marital affair in 1940 when they came up with the ‘Secret Communication System’.

Since we read in the same interview that:

‘Hedy modestly admitted she did only ‘creative work on the invention,’ while the composer and author, George Antheil, ‘did the really important chemical part.’

Hedy was not too clear about how the device worked, but she remembered that she and Anthiel sat down on her living room rug and were using a silver match box with the matches simulating the wiring of the invented ‘thing.’ She said it was lots more fun being scientific than going to the movies.’ (10)

Note that Lamarr clearly says she only did the ‘creative part’ – maybe having suggested the need for some kind of jamming/interference – and Antheil did ‘the really important chemical part’ but since there are no chemicals involved in the ‘Secret Communication System’ patent; Lamarr is probably using the word ‘chemical’ in one of its lesser-known senses in that of alchemical in so far as to produce something from nothing as if by magic.

This then is Lamarr’s polite way of saying ‘Antheil did all the actual work’ and I just ‘gave him ideas’, while Antheil was kind enough to put Lamarr’s name of the patent with his. Although it may have not been as altruistic as it might appear and may rather have been a way to make sure Antheil’s patent was approved and then used (with possible monetary kickbacks for Antheil; whose career was in the doldrums at this point) as Baum implies. (11)

Indeed, Baum points out the whole ‘Hedy Lamarr was a great inventor’ narrative makes little to no sense as he writes how:

‘However, the story really is a bit fantastical, isn’t it? At 18, Ms. Lamarr was acting in soft-porn in Europe, and by 19 she was married to a wealthy industrialist. She didn’t have any education or background in science or technology.  So I did a little research to see if there was more to the story, and here’s what I found. It seems her co-inventor, George Anthiel, was a brilliant composer and inventor, who managed to synchronize numerous player pianos for a one-man show at Carnegie Hall. Using synchronized player piano rolls was the inventive *trick* for implementing the frequency-hopping scheme in the Anthiel-Lamarr patent.’ (12)

As Baum points out the key to the ‘Secret Communication System’ patent was almost certainly George Antheil not Hedy Lamarr.

This hasn’t stopped nonsensical feminist attempts to claim Lamarr was a ‘great (jewish) inventor’ with Catherine Jewell writing in 2018 how:

‘But at night during the Second World War she was doing something far more important – inventing a frequency-hopping communications system for Allied Forces. That system laid the foundation for the GPS, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi technology we use today.’ (13)

The problem with this – of course – is that it pictures Lamarr doing ‘scientific research’ at ‘night’ to help the American military during the Second World War, but this simply isn’t true since her meeting with Antheil occurred in 1940 and the patent was applied for on 10^th June 1941 (14) long before the United States entered what was until then a primarily European war.

Also, as we have seen there is no record of any other ‘scientific work’ by Lamarr other than the ‘Secret Communication System’ patent. (15)

Then Jewell engages in silly counter-factual pleading on Lamarr’s behalf:

‘Hedy never got a penny for any of her inventions. It’s hard to know exactly why, but in part it was because inventing came out of her in a completely natural, irrepressible way.’ (16)

In the first instance; Lamarr didn’t really invent the ‘Secret Communication System’ by her own admission it was George Antheil who did.

In the second; Lamarr and Antheil voluntarily donated their patent to the US Navy in 1941 so they couldn’t expect a monetary return from it as Jewell herself notes later:

‘When Hedy patented her technology, she gave it to the US Navy, but sadly, they didn’t take her seriously. They said it was too bulky and not a useful military technology. What they were really saying was that it was unlikely that an actress and a musician had come up with a technology they could use. In actual fact, it was ahead of its time and some say it could have shortened the war by a year or more. And it was the size of a watch face.’ (17)

Jewell’s suggestion that the ‘too bulky and not a useful military technology’ assertion by the US Navy was just them being snobbish and prejudice is ridiculous because it is quite literally based on no evidence what-so-ever. We know that the US Navy rejected Lamarr and Antheil’s invention as too bulky and not useful for their technology of the time – it being the size of a watch face is simply irrelevant as to whether it would have been useful or too bulky – explicitly because using it would prevent the torpedo fitting in the torpedo tube. (18)

She then makes another silly argument by bringing up how much the patent was worth circa 2000 when Lamarr died:

‘Shortly after that she asked the Smithsonian Museum to value the original patent issued for her frequency-hopping invention. Unfortunately, she died before learning that they put its estimated value at USD 6 million. What I love about this is that it meant her mind was worth twice the value of her face.’ (19)

The problem with this is that Lamarr and Antheil voluntarily gave up/donated their patent to the US Navy in 1941/1942 which means that – while Lamarr was certainly looking at ways to get money late in life – she wasn’t entitled to anything because she had freely done so, and she’d also have had to split any monetary award with George Antheil’s heirs.

Finally, Jewell writes that:

‘We found evidence that Hedy and George’s patent had been handed to military contractors in the 1950s and that the technology was used in military drones and sonobuoys. We know it was used in Milstar satellites and migrated from there to the GPS, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi systems we use today.’ (20)

The problem here is that this simply isn’t true since the ‘evidence’ Jewell is referring to is the testimony of Romuald Ireneus ‘Scibor-Marchocki who was an engineer for a US naval contractor in the mid-1950s and recalls being given a copy of the patent for the ‘Secret Communication System’ to look at – with the unstated sub-text ‘for ideas’ – during his work on a device for locating enemy submarines. (21)

This is certainly not evidence that the ‘Secret Communication System’ patent was used for anything other than study/ideas and the idea that the US Navy – who remember owned the patent then and still do to this day – were ‘hiding’ their use of it from Lamarr and Antheil is simply ridiculous because that is not what ‘Scibor-Marchocki is saying at all.

He’s just recalling he was given a copy to look at!

Thus, we can see that not only is the case for Hedy Lamarr being a ‘great jewish inventor’ bad but the historical evidence goes directly against it!  

References

(1) See my article: https://karlradl14.substack.com/p/jewish-invention-myths-frequency

(2) See my article: https://karlradl14.substack.com/p/jewish-invention-myths-wi-fi

(3) David Kahn, 2014, ‘How I Discovered World War II’s Great Spy and Other Stories of Intelligence and Code’, 1st Edition, CRC Press: Boca Raton, p. 158

(4)   Wladyslaw Kozaczuk, 1984, ‘Enigma: How the German Machine Cipher Was Broken, and How It Was Read by the Allies in World War Two’, 1^st Edition, University Publications of America: Lanham, p. 27

(5) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTOg4bSEw5g

(6) https://zeitgeistfilms.com/film/bombshellthehedylamarrstory also Hal Abelson, Ken Ledeen, Harry Lewis, 2008, ‘Blown to Bits: Your Life, Liberty, and Happiness After the Digital Explosion’, 1^st Edition, Addison-Wesley: Upper Saddle River, p. 279

(7) Abelson, Ledeen, Lewis, Op. Cit.,  p. 278

(8) The Stars and Stripes, ‘Hedy Adds New Twist to War’, 19^th November 1945, p. 1

(9) http://patentlawcenter.pli.edu/2011/12/05/the-truth-about-hedy-lamarr/

(10) The Stars and Stripes, ‘Hedy Adds New Twist to War’, 19^th November 1945, p. 1

(11) http://patentlawcenter.pli.edu/2011/12/05/the-truth-about-hedy-lamarr/

(12) Ibid.

(13) https://www.wipo.int/wipo_magazine/en/2018/02/article_0002.html

(14) https://patents.google.com/patent/US2292387

(15) Abelson, Ledeen, Lewis, Op. Cit.,  p. 279-280

(16) https://www.wipo.int/wipo_magazine/en/2018/02/article_0002.html

(17) Ibid.

(18) https://www.inventionandtech.com/content/hedy-lamarr-radio-controlled-torpedo

(19) https://www.wipo.int/wipo_magazine/en/2018/02/article_0002.html

(20) Ibid.

(21) Abelson, Ledeen, Lewis, Op. Cit.,  p. 280