This is the first biography of the brilliant inventor and practical
experimenter, British-born David Edward Hughes. A contemporary of Edison
and Bell, Hughes made major contributions in the fields of telegraphy,
telephony, metal detection, and audiology. His printing telegraph,
adopted across much of Europe, made him a fortune. Hughes sent and
received wireless signals in 1879, some sixteen years before Marconi,
but faced with the skepticism of his peers, he discontinued his research
and his accomplishments were only recognized years later.