Looking back [birth of the transistor]

"A device called a transistor, which has several applications in radio where a vacuum tube ordinarily is employed, was demonstrated for the first time yesterday" [from the New York Times, July 1,1948]. This official announcement marked the public birth of the pointcontact transistor. Its "private birth," however, had already taken place some six months before, on December 23, 1947. Walter Brattain, one of the inventors, recorded the concluding experiment in his laboratory notebook with this entry: 'This circuit was actually spoken over and, by switching the device in and out, a distinct gain in speech level could be heard and seen on the scope presentation with no noticeable ohange in quality." The successful development of the point-contact transistor was the result of a combination of three main factors: the interdisciplinary nature of the team, which included experimental and theoretical physicists, a physical chemist, and a circuit expert; awareness of the total solid-state theory, made possible through open exchange of information; and the availability of the proper materials. [This article is adapted and abridged, with permission, from the article "How the Transistor Emerged," by Charles Weiner, IEEE Spectrum, January 1973.]