United Nation of Fangirls: Hedy Lamarr Appreciation Post
Do you see this woman?
This woman is Austrian-born Hollywood actress Hedy Lamarr. She stared in movies with Clark Gable, Judy Garland, and Bob Hope. She was declared the ‘most beautiful woman in the world’ in her heyday, and she was one of MGM’s best actresses.
But did you know that this woman was the mother of frequency-hopping radio technology? Hedy Lamarr, alongside composer George Antheil, developed and patented a system originally designed to guide missiles in WWII. Using radio technology and perforated slips of paper to align the frequency switches, Hedy Lamarr and George Antheil developed technology that could have saved hundreds of (Allied) soldiers lives during WWII. The basic concepts of her discovery are used today in Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and pretty much all wireless technology today.
Why isn’t this badass bitch more famous for her intellectual achievements and lauded as a WWII genius? Welp, the government decided that this invention was pretty much useless and passed it off as the silly concoctions of a musician and an actress. When she tried to join the National Inventors Counsel, she was told that her time was better spent using her face to sell war bonds.
This post goes out to Hedy Lamarr, the woman with the body of a Hollywood Goddess and the brains of a ground breaking scientist.
