Thread | Brutkey

December 23, 1947 - Walter Brattain and John Bardeen of Bell Labs, under the direction of William B. Shockley, demonstrated the world's first transistor.

The point-contact transistor was made of two gold foil contacts sitting on a germanium crystal.

The New York Herald Tribune predicted that this invention would be a revolution in the electronics industry.

78 years later, we have chips with over 200 billion transistors and over 1.3E+23 transistors built to date.

https://ethw.org/Milestones:Invention_of_the_First_Transistor_at_Bell_Telephone_Laboratories,_Inc.,_1947
1/n

1. Plaque at Nokia Bell Labs, Bldg. 6, 600 Mountain Ave, New Providence, NJ

Invention of the First Transistor at Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc., 1947

At this site, in Building 1, Room 1E455, from 17 November to 23 December 1947, Walter H. Brattain and John A. Bardeen -- under the direction of William B. Shockley -- discovered the transistor effect, and developed and demonstrated a point-contact germanium transistor. This led directly to developments in solid-state devices that revolutionized the electronics industry and changed the way people around the world lived, learned, worked, and played.

2. Pic of John A. Bardeen, William B. Shockley, and Walter H. Brattain at Bell Telephone Laboratories

3. Pic of the first point-contact transistor replica in a display case

Ross of Ottawa
@ottaross@mastodon.social

@AkaSci@fosstodon.org notable day indeed!

I led a small research team at Bell Labs for a couple of years, and whenever visiting that particular building, I'd make a stop at the display of their first transistor. The little device has been a notable part of my career at several points.