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eventVerified

Marconi’s transatlantic signal captures the wireless market Tesla had sold to Morgan

On 12 December 1901 Guglielmo Marconi reported receiving a transatlantic wireless signal in Newfoundland. Investors treated the race Tesla had sold to Morgan as over. In the causal graph this event weakens Antitrust Pressure in Digital Markets, a driver that strengthens Out-of-School Rate, Primary School Age (global) — an improving welfare path.

Sources: [1][2]

Read the full account

On 12 December 1901 Guglielmo Marconi reported receiving a transatlantic wireless signal in Newfoundland. Investors treated the race Tesla had sold to Morgan as over. Tesla’s 645,576 patent remained on file; commercial radio did not pay him as the system owner in his lifetime.

Context

Lodge, Popov, Stone and others share the radio file. The 1943 Supreme Court decision is a later Fact.

Nikola Tesla is not the sole author of every later object, law, or museum label that uses the name. Shared work with courts, excavators, printers, spouses, officials, and later states does not erase a documented role, and it does not make an ancient person the signer of a twentieth-century statute.

Why it matters

Communications-platform path. High confidence on the 1901 demonstration and Tesla’s lifetime commercial defeat.

A market loss is not a later Court myth. Split 1901 and 1943.

Who was responsible

Contribution type and responsibility level for each recorded actor — not sole-author shorthand.

  • Nikola Tesla

    Person

    Direct responsibility

    responsibility level 0.4 · verified

    Complex: Marconi’s demonstration plus Tesla’s prior patents and later suits. Tesla did not sit as judge. Lifetime commercial loss is the stored cost.

What changed

Fact → Driver → Indicator. Relationship strength orders the paths; it is not the observed indicator movement.

Evidence

The sources behind this fact and its verification state.

Verified2 sources on file
  1. 1.Smithsonian Magazine — Tesla’s Wardenclyffe towerSmithsonian Magazine · High credibility · verified
  2. 2.U.S. Patent 645,576 — System of Transmission of Electrical Energy (1900)United States Patent and Trademark Office / Google Patents · High credibility · verified
What the sources establish

Smithsonian’s Wardenclyffe essay independently dates Marconi’s 1901 signal as the market event that stranded the tower. Tesla’s 1900 patent is the official prior instrument.

Established: Marconi’s 1901 transatlantic claim and Tesla’s failure to own the resulting wireless market. Not established: that Tesla uniquely invented radio, or that every later mobile network is this December night.

Causal path

How this event connects to drivers and indicators in the graph.

  1. ActorNikola Tesla
  2. contributed toFactMarconi’s transatlantic signal captures the wireless market Tesla had sold to Morgan
  3. weakensDriverAntitrust Pressure in Digital Markets
  4. strengthensIndicatorOut-of-School Rate, Primary School Age (global)

Cite this page

Factrail. (2026). Marconi’s transatlantic signal captures the wireless market Tesla had sold to Morgan. Factrail. https://factrail.ai/facts/us-tesla-marconi-transatlantic-1901

https://factrail.ai/facts/us-tesla-marconi-transatlantic-1901

Accessed 16 October 2026.

By the Factrail desk · Method: how we source and score · Last reviewed

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