Joseph Tykociński-Tykociner
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Joseph Tykociński-Tykociner (also known as Joseph T. Tykociner; 5 October 1877, in
Włocławek Włocławek (Polish pronunciation: ; german: Leslau) is a city located in central Poland along the Vistula (Wisła) River and is bordered by the Gostynin-Włocławek Landscape Park. As of December 2021, the population of the city is 106,928. Loc ...
,
Congress Poland Congress Poland, Congress Kingdom of Poland, or Russian Poland, formally known as the Kingdom of Poland, was a polity created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna as a semi-autonomous Polish state, a successor to Napoleon's Duchy of Warsaw. It w ...
– 11 June 1969, in
Urbana, Illinois Urbana ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Champaign County, Illinois, United States. As of the 2020 census, Urbana had a population of 38,336. As of the 2010 United States Census, Urbana is the List of municipalities in Illinois, 38th-most pop ...
,
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
) was a Polish engineer and a pioneer of
sound-on-film Sound-on-film is a class of sound film processes where the sound accompanying a picture is recorded on photographic film, usually, but not always, the same strip of film carrying the picture. Sound-on-film processes can either record an analog ...
technology. In 1921 he became the first research professor of
engineering Engineering is the use of scientific method, scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad rang ...
at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Univ ...
. Within a year of his arrival at the University, he conducted the first sound-on-film
motion picture A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...
recordings at a physics demonstration that showed how pictures and sound could be synchronized to produce a "
talkie A sound film is a motion picture A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, percep ...
", a motion picture with sound.


Life

Tykociner was born into a
Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""Th ...
ish family in
Włocławek Włocławek (Polish pronunciation: ; german: Leslau) is a city located in central Poland along the Vistula (Wisła) River and is bordered by the Gostynin-Włocławek Landscape Park. As of December 2021, the population of the city is 106,928. Loc ...
, a town in Polish territory then under Russian control.
Moone, Tom, "Joseph Tykociner: Pioneer of sound on film" Ingenuity. University of Illinois Electrical and Computer Engineering Department. retrieved Dec. 17, 2006
He worked for the
Marconi Company The Marconi Company was a British telecommunications and engineering company that did business under that name from 1963 to 1987. Its roots were in the Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company founded by Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi in 1897 ...
in 1901 in London at the time the first radio signal was transmitted across the Atlantic. At the age of eighteen he came to the United States. In New York City he met
Nikola Tesla Nikola Tesla ( ; ,"Tesla"
''
He was at St. Petersburg's Helsinki Station when Lenin returned from exile in 1917. After the
Russian Revolution of 1917 The Russian Revolution was a period of political and social revolution that took place in the former Russian Empire which began during the First World War. This period saw Russia abolish its monarchy and adopt a socialist form of government ...
he worked on radio for the Polish government.


Sound film

He worked from 1918 to develop a system of recording and reproducing synchronized sound on motion picture film. He became the
University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the University ...
's first research professor of engineering in 1921. On June 9, 1922, Tykociner publicly demonstrated for the first time a motion picture with a soundtrack optically recorded directly onto the film. When Tykociner demonstrated the first sound-on-film motion picture recordings the projector had a
photoelectric cell A solar cell, or photovoltaic cell, is an electronic device that converts the energy of light directly into electricity by the photovoltaic effect, which is a physical and chemical phenomenon.
made by his Illinois colleague
Jakob Kunz Jakob Kunz (November 3, 1874 – July 18, 1938) was an American physicist who pioneered the development and application of photoelectric cells. Born in Brittnau, Switzerland, he earned his bachelor's degree in 1897 and his Ph.D in 1902 from the ...
at its heart. In the first sounds ever publicly heard from a composite image-and-audio film, Helena Tykociner, the inventor's wife, spoke the words, "I will ring," and then rang a bell. Next, Ellery Paine, head of the university's Department of Electrical Engineering, recited the
Gettysburg Address The Gettysburg Address is a Public speaking, speech that President of the United States, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln delivered during the American Civil War at the dedication of the Gettysburg National Cemetery, Soldiers' National Cemetery, ...
. The demonstration was written up in the ''
New York World The ''New York World'' was a newspaper published in New York City from 1860 until 1931. The paper played a major role in the history of American newspapers. It was a leading national voice of the Democratic Party. From 1883 to 1911 under publi ...
'' on July 30, 1922. A dispute between Tykociner and university president David Kinley over patent rights to the process thwarted its commercial application. Tykociner applied for a patent shortly before the public demonstration. The patent was awarded in 1926. Many people consider
Theodore Case Theodore Willard Case (December 12, 1888 – May 13, 1944) was an American chemist and inventor known for the invention of the Movietone sound-on-film system. Early life and education Theodore Willard Case was born in 1888 in Auburn, New Yo ...
as the inventor of the sound film even though Tykociński made sound film 3 years before him. TYK In 1919,
Lee De Forest Lee de Forest (August 26, 1873 – June 30, 1961) was an American inventor and a fundamentally important early pioneer in electronics. He invented the first electronic device for controlling current flow; the three-element "Audion" triode va ...
filed patents for his sound-on-film process
Phonofilm Phonofilm is an optical sound-on-film system developed by inventors Lee de Forest and Theodore Case in the early 1920s. Introduction In 1919 and 1920, Lee De Forest, inventor of the audion tube, filed his first patents on a sound-on-film process, ...
, unaware of Tykociner's work. DeForest, working with
Theodore Case Theodore Willard Case (December 12, 1888 – May 13, 1944) was an American chemist and inventor known for the invention of the Movietone sound-on-film system. Early life and education Theodore Willard Case was born in 1888 in Auburn, New Yo ...
, produced several short films in 1921 and 1922, and introduced Phonofilm at a presentation at the Rivoli Theater in New York City on April 15, 1923. Case and DeForest had a falling out, and Case took his patents to William Fox, who used Case's patents to develop
Fox Movietone Movietone News is a newsreel that ran from 1928 to 1963 in the United States. Under the name British Movietone News, it also ran in the United Kingdom from 1929 to 1986, in France also produced by Fox-Europa, in Australia and New Zealand until 1970 ...
.


Radar

In the 1920s, Tykociner did antenna design research that was a precursor to
radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (''ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ...
.


Zetetics

After his official retirement in 1946, he did research in a new field he termed "zetetics," (not to be confused with
zeteticism Marcello Truzzi (September 6, 1935 – February 2, 2003) was a professor of sociology at New College of Florida and later at Eastern Michigan University, founding co-chairman of the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Para ...
, Marcello Truzzi's term for scientific skepticism), which Tykociński-Tykociner described as the collection and systematization of "all information about research activities, including creative processes, with the view of extending that knowledge which leads to discoveries, inventions, and the solution of human problems." This included the study of the science of research and the relationship between science and art. When he died in 1969 in
Urbana, Illinois Urbana ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Champaign County, Illinois, United States. As of the 2020 census, Urbana had a population of 38,336. As of the 2010 United States Census, Urbana is the List of municipalities in Illinois, 38th-most pop ...
, his estate and papers were left to the university. The Tykociner Memorial Lectures began in 1972 with a lecture by
Dennis Gabor Dennis Gabor ( ; hu, Gábor Dénes, ; 5 June 1900 – 9 February 1979) was a Hungarian-British electrical engineer and physicist, most notable for inventing holography, for which he later received the 1971 Nobel Prize in Physics. He obtaine ...
. Through 1998, other distinguished scientists and artists spoke on the relationship between science and the arts, including
Leon Cooper Leon N Cooper (born February 28, 1930) is an American physicist and Nobel Prize laureate who, with John Bardeen and John Robert Schrieffer, developed the BCS theory of superconductivity. His name is also associated with the Cooper pair and co-deve ...
,
Leon Lederman Leon, Léon (French) or León (Spanish) may refer to: Places Europe * León, Spain, capital city of the Province of León * Province of León, Spain * Kingdom of León, an independent state in the Iberian Peninsula from 910 to 1230 and again fro ...
, and
Freeman Dyson Freeman John Dyson (15 December 1923 – 28 February 2020) was an English-American theoretical physicist and mathematician known for his works in quantum field theory, astrophysics, random matrices, mathematical formulation of quantum m ...
. In 2002 the lectures were changed to weekly lectures in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. The Tykociner Memorial Lectures at the University of Illinois' Champaign-Urbana Campus. retrieved Dec. 17, 2006


See also

*
List of multiple discoveries Historians and sociologists have remarked upon the occurrence, in science, of " multiple independent discovery". Robert K. Merton defined such "multiples" as instances in which similar discoveries are made by scientists working independently of ea ...
*
List of Poles This is a partial list of notable Polish or Polish-speaking or -writing people. People of partial Polish heritage have their respective ancestries credited. Science Physics * Czesław Białobrzeski * Andrzej Buras * Georges Charpak ...
*
Eric Tigerstedt Eric Magnus Campbell Tigerstedt (August 14, 1887 – April 20, 1925) was one of the most significant inventors in Finland at the beginning of the 20th century and has been called the "Thomas Edison of Finland". He was a pioneer of sound-on- ...
*
Heinz von Foerster Heinz von Foerster (German spelling: Heinz von Förster; November 13, 1911 – October 2, 2002) was an Austrian American scientist combining physics and philosophy, and widely attributed as the originator of Second-order cybernetics. He was twice ...
*
Charles A. Hoxie Charles A. Hoxie (1867–1941) creator of the pallophotophone at General Electric, and is credited as one of the inventors of sound film, and as father of the "talking picture". During his career (1912–32) at General Electric, he devised a so ...
*
List of film sound systems The following is a list of sound film, film sound systems. Explanation *The year shown may represent a patent or other developmental milestone rather than the first use in public. *Technologically identical systems may have been promoted under di ...


Notes


External links

*, showing five second clip at beginning from Tykociner 1922 sound on film demo. {{DEFAULTSORT:Tykocinski, Jozef 1877 births 1969 deaths Polish engineers Polish emigrants to the United States American engineers American inventors American scientists 19th-century Polish Jews Fellows of the American Physical Society