Richard Rhodes: "Hedy's Folly: The Life and Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr"
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-12-20/richard-rhodes-hedys-folly-life-and-breakthrough-inventions-hedy-lamarr
Antheils w Hedy (left to right: unknown, Boski Antheil, Hedy, George, unknown)
Courtesy Estate of George Antheil
Hedwig Kiesler was born in Vienna in 1913. The only child of well-to-do, assimilated Jewish parents, she dreamed of becoming a movie star. At 16, she dropped out of school to pursue an acting career. At 20, she married a wealthy Austrian arms dealer to the Nazis. Divorced three years later and on a ship to America, she met MGM head Louis B. Mayer and changed her name to Hedy Lamarr. She arrived in Hollywood with not only acting talent and beauty, but also a knowledge of military technology and a love for inventing. One of her patents for a new wireless technology became the basis for bluetooth, GPS, wireless telephones and most military communications. She was often called the most beautiful woman in the world. The author of a new biography reveals she was much more. Richard Rhodes sets the record straight and explains what it takes to be an inventor.
Guests
Richard Rhodes
author or editor of 23 books including "The Making of the Atomic Bomb, which won a Pulitzer Prize, a National Book Award and a National Book Critics Circle Award.
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Ecstasy was made by a Czech!! director, Gustav Machaty, not Hungarian... :-)
The musical "Little Shop of Horrors" includes a song about desires, with the line, "How 'bout a date with Hedy Lamarr?" Now I see why! Thanks for a fascinating look at an amazing woman!
The Austrian Academy of Sciences sponsors a Hedy Lamarr lecture series.
My mother used to tell me from time to time that when she was a little girl, on a flight to California in the 1940s, Hedy Lamarr brushed her hair and told her that she loved her curly blonde hair. I never knew who she was, so thank you for sharing so much about this fascinating woman.