Join us at St. Elmo’s Coffee Pub at 2300 Mt. Vernon Ave., Alexandria, VA for our monthly book club. For June's book discussion we will look at Richard Rhodes 2011 biography of Hedy Lamarr: "Hedy's Folly: The Life & Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World."
From Amazon: Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Rhodes delivers a remarkable story of science history: how a ravishing film star and an avant-garde composer invented spread-spectrum radio, the technology that made wireless phones, GPS systems, and many other devices possible. Beginning at a Hollywood dinner table, "Hedy's Folly" tells a wild story of innovation that culminates in U.S. patent number 2,292,387 for a "secret communication system." Along the way Rhodes weaves together Hollywood’s golden era, the history of Vienna, 1920s Paris, weapons design, music, a tutorial on patent law and a brief treatise on transmission technology. Narrated with the rigor and charisma we've come to expect of Rhodes, it is a remarkable narrative adventure about spread-spectrum radio's genesis and unlikely amateur inventors collaborating to change the world.