Benjamin Gross (Linda Hall Library)
Hagley Museum and Library
Did you know that RCA was hard at work on a flat panel television in the 1950s? Only a few years after the company pioneered color television, RCA’s imaginative leader David Sarnoff set his talented scientists and engineers to work on developing a television that could hang on a wall. After a decade of research RCA could announce the creation of a new form of electronic display that relied upon an obscure set of materials known as liquid crystals (LCD’s) that would make a flat-panel television possible. Yet at its moment of great triumph, RCA turned away from further development of its technological breakthrough, leaving the proliferation of flat-panel televisions to other companies.
Based on research in the RCA archives held at Hagley, Benjamin Gross will chart the creative energies that generated the invention of the by-now ubiquitous liquid crystals that are in our watches, phones, and even our televisions – and why RCA never capitalized on its invention. His talk is based on his 2018 book, The TVs of Tomorrow: How RCA’s Flat-Screen Dreams Led to the First LCDs.