Guglielmo Marconi forms his Wireless Telegraph and…

Guglielmo Marconi forms his Wireless Telegraph and Signal Company in the United Kingdom in 1897.

Marconi had made the first demonstration of his system for the British government in July 1896.

A further series of demonstrations for the British followed, and, by March 1897, Marconi has transmitted Morse code signals over a distance of about six kilometers (3.7 miles) across Salisbury Plain.

On May 13, 1897, Marconi sends the first ever wireless communication over open sea—a message is transmitted over the Bristol Channel from Flat Holm Island to Lavernock Point in Penarth, a distance of six kilometers (3.7 miles).

The message reads "Are you ready".

The transmitting equipment is almost immediately relocated to Brean Down Fort on the Somerset coast, stretching the range to sixteen kilometers (9.9 miles).

Impressed by these and other demonstrations, William Preece, the Chief Electrical Engineer of the British Post Office, introduces Marconi's ongoing work to the general public at two important London lectures: "Telegraphy without Wires", at the Toynbee Hall on December 11 , 1896; and "Signalling through Space without Wires", given to the Royal Institution on June 4, 1897.