BTH Research Laboratory
of Rugby
1924 Reginald Charles Clinker was appointed head of the research laboratoru
1924 British Thomson-Houston (BTH) completed a new building (no.52) at its Rugby works to house the research laboratory. The first staff, 18 people in all, were brought together by combining the earlier Experimental Electrical Laboratory and the Insulation Laboratory. The head of the group was R. C. Clinker (1874-1931) with Hugh Warren (1891-1961) as deputy chief.
1929 Hugh Warren was appointed Head of the laboratory.
1931 produced the first 16mm sound film in Great Britain which was exhibited in 1931
Undertook pioneering work on fluorescent lamps with the first high wattage mains voltage lamps being designed and made in the Research Laboratory.
And many other achievements.
WWII C. J. Milner worked on developing the klystron valve Mark Oliphant of the University of Birmingham. BTH tried to replicate Oliphant's development in 3 to 4 weeks but were unsuccessful. This work was overtaken by work elsewhere on the cavity magnetron for radar microwave generation.
1946 The Electronic Engineering Department was split off from the Research Laboratory.
1947 The Hungarian scientist Dennis Gabor invented holography at the BTH site in Rugby.
See Also
Sources of Information
- IET [1]