In 1949 when I was 7, I played with electrical toys such as batteries and bulbs. We also had some germanium crystals left over from my grandfather's pre-war radio shop.
By chance I connected up two cat's whiskers and a germanium crystal to form what I know now is a transistor.
I found that I could light a bulb is a second battery and bulb circuit by touching a whisker (attached to the first circuit) on to the crystal near where the second whiskers was touching the crystal.
My grandfather realised it might be important and thought he would keep it until I was 21. I managed to get hold of the bits I had used and wrote a few lines and sent it in a matchbox and envelope to the Bell Telephone labs in America.
I do not know the outcome and I knew nothing of the semiconductor studies that were going on there.
However I called it (to a man who called to ask me about it) a "transfer resistor" because the resistance in the second circuit appeared to be transferred to the first circuit. The Man said "transistor" and left after talking to my grandfather.
I did not understand about money then.
| + - |
| + - |
| Push Button |
| 3V min Bulb |
| Germanium crystal |
| whiskers |
| 1.5 V battery |
| 3V battery |
| Screwed mount |
Apparatus as I remember it is shown above, it is possible that the polarity is wrong.
I did have some ideas about positive charge carriers injected into the crystal at the left hand cats whisker and collected by the right hand cats whisker. I did not know about electrons then.
Chris
11/03/2004