Unstoppable: Hedy Lamarr

Discovery

BBC

Science, Technology

4.3 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 13 May 2024

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Dr Julia Ravey and Dr Ella Hubber both have a love of science, but it turns out there’s a lot they don’t know about some of the leading women at the front of the inventing game. In Unstoppable, Dr Julia and Dr Ella tell each other the hidden, world-shaping stories of the engineers, innovators and inventors they wish they’d known about when they were starting out as scientists. This week, the story of the Hollywood starlet whose brilliant ideas would go on to revolutionise the way we live.

Known as the ‘most beautiful woman in film’ during the 1940s, Hedy Lamarr was one of the most in demand Hollywood actresses of her time. But she wasn’t just a movie star. From a young age, she also had a knack for inventing – she liked to take her toys apart just to see how they worked. And she carried this passion into her adult life – creating an invention that laid the groundwork for technology many of us couldn’t live without: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and GPS.

But it didn’t come without struggle. Dr Julia and Dr Ella take us through Hedy’s remarkable journey, and we get a first-hand look into Hedy’s life from her daughter Denise Loder-DeLuca.

Presenters: Dr Ella Hubber and Dr Julia Ravey Producers: Ella Hubber and Julia Ravey Assistant producer: Sophie Ormiston Editor: Holly Squire

Transcript

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0:00.0	Before you listen to this BBC podcast I'd like to introduce myself.
0:03.4	My name's Stevie Middleton and I'm a BBC commissioner for a load of sport
0:07.4	podcasts. I'm lucky to do that at the BBC because I get to work with
0:10.7	leading journalists, experienced pundits and the biggest
0:13.2	sports stars. Together we bring you untold stories and fascinating insights
0:17.5	straight from the player's mouths. But the best thing about doing this at the BBC is our unique access to the sporting world.
0:24.4	What that means is that we can bring you podcasts that create a real connection
0:28.7	to dedicated sports fans across the UK.
0:31.1	So if you like this podcast, head over to BBC Sounds where you'll find plenty more.
0:37.3	In the back of a top secret military meeting a woman sits silently listening to a conversation about how to improve Austria's
0:46.1	arsenal of weapons. She was brought along by her husband, an arms dealer who deployed
0:51.6	her beauty as his own secret weapon to make a sale.
0:55.7	But little did he know that his trophy wife sitting like a doll was taking in every single word they said and she would later use this
1:06.0	information to change the world. I'm Julia Ravi and I'm Ella Hubber. We both make science radio programs for the BBC.
1:15.0	But before that we were scientists and these are the stories we wish we'd known.
1:20.0	This is unstoppable for discovery on the BBC World Service.
1:24.0	Okay, today Ella, I've got a story for you about the incredible life of an
1:30.5	underestimated woman whose invention led to the technology behind Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and
1:35.8	GPS and her name was Heddie Lamar.
1:41.0	Heddie Lamar, that name is definitely familiar to me. Why is that familiar?
1:46.0	Because she was one of the biggest fem-fatal Hollywood superstars in the 1940s.
1:51.0	Okay, yes, I knew I knew the name. I can picture her now actually
	...

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