Hedy Lamarr
Encyclopedia
Hedy Lamarr was an Austrian-American
actress celebrated for her great beauty who was a major contract star of MGM
's "Golden Age".
Lamarr also co-invented – with composer George Antheil
– an early technique for spread spectrum
communications and frequency hopping, necessary to wireless communication from the pre-computer age to the present day.
, Austria-Hungary
, the only child of Jewish parents, Gertrud (née Lichtwitz), a pianist and Budapest
native who came from the "Jewish haute bourgeoisie
", and Lemberg-born Emil Kiesler, a successful bank director. Her father died in Vienna
before the Holocaust, and Lamarr rescued her mother.
She studied ballet and piano at age 10. When she worked with Max Reinhardt
in Berlin
, he called her the "most beautiful woman in Europe". Soon the teenage girl played major roles in German movies, alongside stars like Heinz Rühmann
and Hans Moser
.
's notorious film Ecstasy
, a Czechoslovak
film made in Prague
, in which she played the love-hungry young wife of an indifferent older husband. Closeups of her face during orgasm in one scene (rumored to be unsimulated), and full frontal shots of her in another scene, swimming and running nude through the woods, gave the film great notoriety.
On 10 August 1933, aged 19, she married Friedrich Mandl
, a Vienna
-based arms manufacturer 13 years her senior. In her autobiography Ecstasy and Me, Lamarr described Mandl as an extremely controlling man who sometimes tried to keep her shut up in their mansion. The Austrian bought as many copies of Ecstasy
as he could possibly find, objecting to her in the film, and "...the expression on her face." (Lamarr in her autobiography, objecting to the rumors about real sex, admitted that her costar had indeed played the scene with her using "method acting reality," but she also stated that the film's director had simulated looks of passion from offscreen by poking her in the bottom with a safety pin.)
Mandl prevented her from pursuing her acting career, and instead took her to meetings with technicians and business partners. In these meetings, the mathematically talented Lamarr learned about military technology. Otherwise she had to stay at their castle home, Schloss Schwarzenau. She later related that, although Mandl was part-Jewish, he consorted with Nazi industrialists. In Ecstasy and Me, Lamarr wrote that Benito Mussolini
and Adolf Hitler
attended Mandl's grand parties. She related that in 1937 she disguised herself as one of her maids and fled to Paris, where she obtained a divorce, and then moved to London. According to another version of the episode, she persuaded Mandl to allow her to attend a party wearing all her expensive jewelry, later drugged him with the help of her maid, and made her escape out of the country with the jewelry.
in London
. After he hired her, at his insistence, she changed her name to Hedy Lamarr, choosing the surname in homage to a beautiful film star of the silent era, Barbara La Marr
, who had died in 1926 from tuberculosis.
In Hollywood, she was usually cast as glamorous and seductive. Her American debut was in Algiers
(1938). Her many films include Boom Town
(1940), White Cargo
(1942), and Tortilla Flat
(1942), based on the novel by John Steinbeck
. White Cargo, one of Lamarr's biggest hits at MGM, contains arguably her most famous film quote, "Tondelayo make tiffin". In 1941, she was cast alongside two other Hollywood beauties, Lana Turner
and Judy Garland
in the musical extravaganza Ziegfeld Girl
.
Lamarr made 18 films from 1940 to 1949 even though she had two children during that time (in 1945 and 1947). After leaving MGM in 1945, she enjoyed her biggest success as Delilah
in Cecil B. DeMille
's Samson and Delilah
, the highest-grossing film of 1949, with Victor Mature
as the Biblical strongman
. However, following her comedic turn opposite Bob Hope
in My Favorite Spy
(1951), her career went into decline. She appeared only sporadically in films after 1950, one of her last roles being that of Joan of Arc
in Irwin Allen
's critically panned epic The Story of Mankind (1957).
The publication of her autobiography Ecstasy and Me
(1967) took place about a year after accusations of shoplifting
, and a year after Andy Warhol
's short film Hedy (1966), also known as The Shoplifter. The shoplifting charges coincided with a failed return to the screen in Picture Mommy Dead (1966). The role was ultimately filled by Zsa Zsa Gabor
. Ecstasy and Me begins in a despondent mood, with this reference:
, a son of German immigrants and neighbor of Lamarr, had experimented with automated control of musical instruments, including his music for Ballet Mécanique
, originally written for Fernand Léger
's 1924 abstract film. This score involved multiple player piano
s playing simultaneously.
Lamarr took her idea to Antheil and together, Antheil and Lamarr submitted the idea of a secret communication system in June 1941. On August 11, 1942, US Patent 2,292,387 was granted to Antheil and "Hedy Kiesler Markey", Lamarr's married name at the time. This early version of frequency hopping used a piano roll
to change between 88 frequencies and was intended to make radio-guided torpedo
es harder for enemies to detect or jam. Although a presentation of the technique was soon made to the U.S. Navy, it met with opposition and was not adopted.
The idea was not implemented in the USA until 1962, when it was used by U.S. military ships during a blockade of Cuba after the patent had expired. Perhaps owing to this lag in development, the patent was little-known until 1997, when the Electronic Frontier Foundation
gave Lamarr an award for this contribution. It is reported that, in 1998, Ottawa wireless technology developer Wi-LAN, Inc. "acquired a 49 percent claim to the patent from Lamarr for an undisclosed amount of stock" (Eliza Schmidkunz, Inside GNSS), although expired patents have no economic value. Antheil had died in 1959.
Lamarr's and Antheil's frequency-hopping idea serves as a basis for modern spread-spectrum communication technology
, such as COFDM used in Wi-Fi
network connections and CDMA used in some cordless and wireless telephones. Blackwell, Martin, and Vernam's 1920 patent Secrecy Communication System (1598673) seems to lay the communications groundwork for Kiesler and Antheil's patent, which employed the techniques in the autonomous control of torpedoes.
Lamarr wanted to join the National Inventors Council, but was reportedly told by NIC member Charles F. Kettering and others that she could better help the war effort by using her celebrity status to sell War Bonds. She once raised $7,000,000 at just one event.
For several years during the 1990s, the boxes of CorelDRAW
's software suites were graced by a large Corel-drawn image of Hedy Lamarr, in tribute to her pre-computer scientific discoveries. These pictures were winners in CorelDRAW's yearly software suite cover design contests. Lamarr sued Corel for using the image without her permission. Corel countered that she did not own rights to the image. They reached an undisclosed settlement in 1999.
.
For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Hedy Lamarr has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
at 6247 Hollywood Blvd.
on April 10, 1953.
Lamarr was married to:
According to her autobiography
, Ecstasy and Me (1966), once while running away from Friedrich Mandl, she slipped into a brothel
and hid in an empty room. While her husband searched the brothel, a man entered the room and she had sex with him so she could remain hidden. She was finally successful in escaping when she hired a new maid
who resembled her; she drugged the maid and used her uniform as a disguise to escape. Lamarr later sued the publisher, saying that many of the anecdote
s in the book, which was described by a judge as "filthy, nauseating, and revolting", were fabricated by its ghost writer, Leo Guild.
Mel Brooks
' popular 1974 comedy film Blazing Saddles
featured a villain named Hedley Lamarr, who is frequently and inadvertently referred to by other characters as Hedy. In an interview included in the DVD
release of the film Brooks says that Hedy Lamarr threatened to sue the producers, believing that the running joke infringed her right of publicity. In one scene, Brooks' character tells the villainous Hedley that "this is 1874 – you'll be able to sue her!" Brooks said they settled out of court for a small sum.
Lamarr died in Casselberry, Florida
on January 19, 2000, aged 86, from natural causes. Her son Anthony Loder took her ashes to Austria and spread them in the Vienna Woods, in accordance with her last wishes.
.
Hedy Lamarr is referenced in the film Blazing Saddles
on a number of occasions.
In 2003, the Boeing
corporation ran a series of recruitment ads featuring Hedy Lamarr as a woman of science. No reference to her film career was made in the ads.
In 2005, the first Inventor's Day
in German
-speaking countries was held in her honor on November 9, on what would have been her 92nd birthday.
The 2010 New York Public Library's exhibit: “Thirty Years of Photography at the New York Public Library” includes a photo of topless Lamarr (ca. 1930) by Austrian-born American photographer Trude Fleischmann.
Austrian-American
Austrian Americans are Americans of Austrian descent. According to the 2000 US census, there are 735,128, or 0.3% Americans of full or partial Austrian descent. The states with the largest Austrian American populations are New York , California , Pennsylvania , Florida and New Jersey...
actress celebrated for her great beauty who was a major contract star of MGM
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
's "Golden Age".
Lamarr also co-invented – with composer George Antheil
George Antheil
George Antheil was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author and inventor. A self-described "Bad Boy of Music", his modernist compositions amazed and appalled listeners in Europe and the US during the 1920s with their cacophonous celebration of mechanical devices.Returning permanently to...
– an early technique for spread spectrum
Spread spectrum
Spread-spectrum techniques are methods by which a signal generated in a particular bandwidth is deliberately spread in the frequency domain, resulting in a signal with a wider bandwidth...
communications and frequency hopping, necessary to wireless communication from the pre-computer age to the present day.
Early life
Lamarr was born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler in ViennaVienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary
Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...
, the only child of Jewish parents, Gertrud (née Lichtwitz), a pianist and Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
native who came from the "Jewish haute bourgeoisie
Bourgeoisie
In sociology and political science, bourgeoisie describes a range of groups across history. In the Western world, between the late 18th century and the present day, the bourgeoisie is a social class "characterized by their ownership of capital and their related culture." A member of the...
", and Lemberg-born Emil Kiesler, a successful bank director. Her father died in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
before the Holocaust, and Lamarr rescued her mother.
She studied ballet and piano at age 10. When she worked with Max Reinhardt
Max Reinhardt
----Max Reinhardt was an Austrian theater and film director and actor.-Biography:...
in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, he called her the "most beautiful woman in Europe". Soon the teenage girl played major roles in German movies, alongside stars like Heinz Rühmann
Heinz Rühmann
Heinrich Wilhelm "Heinz" Rühmann was a popular German film actor.-Life and work:Rühmann was born in Essen, Westphalia. His role in the 1930 movie Die Drei von der Tankstelle led him to film stardom. He remained highly popular as a comedic actor throughout the 1930s and early 1940s...
and Hans Moser
Hans Moser (actor)
Hans Moser was an Austrian actor who, during his long career, from the 1920s up to his death, mainly played in comedy films. He was particularly associated with the genre of the Wiener Film...
.
Career
In early 1933 she starred in Gustav MachatýGustav Machatý
Gustav Machatý was a Czech film director, screenwriter and actor. He directed 17 films between 1919 and 1955, including Ecstasy...
's notorious film Ecstasy
Ecstasy (film)
Ecstasy – Extase in Czech, Ekstase in German – is a Czech film made in 1933 by the Czech director Gustav Machatý. It stars Hedy Lamarr, credited under her original surname Kiesler, and Zvonimir Rogoz....
, a Czechoslovak
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
film made in Prague
Prague
Prague is the capital and largest city of the Czech Republic. Situated in the north-west of the country on the Vltava river, the city is home to about 1.3 million people, while its metropolitan area is estimated to have a population of over 2.3 million...
, in which she played the love-hungry young wife of an indifferent older husband. Closeups of her face during orgasm in one scene (rumored to be unsimulated), and full frontal shots of her in another scene, swimming and running nude through the woods, gave the film great notoriety.
On 10 August 1933, aged 19, she married Friedrich Mandl
Friedrich Mandl
Friedrich Mandl was chairman of Hirtenberger Patronen-Fabrik, a leading Austrian armaments firm founded by his father, Alexander Mandl....
, a Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
-based arms manufacturer 13 years her senior. In her autobiography Ecstasy and Me, Lamarr described Mandl as an extremely controlling man who sometimes tried to keep her shut up in their mansion. The Austrian bought as many copies of Ecstasy
Ecstasy (film)
Ecstasy – Extase in Czech, Ekstase in German – is a Czech film made in 1933 by the Czech director Gustav Machatý. It stars Hedy Lamarr, credited under her original surname Kiesler, and Zvonimir Rogoz....
as he could possibly find, objecting to her in the film, and "...the expression on her face." (Lamarr in her autobiography, objecting to the rumors about real sex, admitted that her costar had indeed played the scene with her using "method acting reality," but she also stated that the film's director had simulated looks of passion from offscreen by poking her in the bottom with a safety pin.)
Mandl prevented her from pursuing her acting career, and instead took her to meetings with technicians and business partners. In these meetings, the mathematically talented Lamarr learned about military technology. Otherwise she had to stay at their castle home, Schloss Schwarzenau. She later related that, although Mandl was part-Jewish, he consorted with Nazi industrialists. In Ecstasy and Me, Lamarr wrote that Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
and Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
attended Mandl's grand parties. She related that in 1937 she disguised herself as one of her maids and fled to Paris, where she obtained a divorce, and then moved to London. According to another version of the episode, she persuaded Mandl to allow her to attend a party wearing all her expensive jewelry, later drugged him with the help of her maid, and made her escape out of the country with the jewelry.
Hollywood
First she went to Paris, then met Louis B. MayerLouis B. Mayer
Louis Burt Mayer born Lazar Meir was an American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the "star system" within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B...
in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. After he hired her, at his insistence, she changed her name to Hedy Lamarr, choosing the surname in homage to a beautiful film star of the silent era, Barbara La Marr
Barbara La Marr
Barbara La Marr was an American stage and film actress, cabaret artist and screenwriter.La Marr was known as "The Girl Who Is Too Beautiful", after a Hearst newspaper feature writer, Adela Rogers St...
, who had died in 1926 from tuberculosis.
Algiers (film)
Algiers is a 1938 American drama film directed by John Cromwell and starring Charles Boyer, Sigrid Gurie, and Hedy Lamarr. The Walter Wanger production was a remake of the successful 1937 French film Pépé le Moko, which derived its plot from the Henri La Barthe novel of the same name...
(1938). Her many films include Boom Town
Boom Town (film)
Boom Town is a 1940 adventure drama Hollywood film starring Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Claudette Colbert, Hedy Lamarr, and Frank Morgan. A story written by James Edward Grant in Cosmopolitan magazine titled "A Lady Comes to Burkburnett" provided the inspiration for the film.-Plot:"Big John"...
(1940), White Cargo
White Cargo
White Cargo is a film starring Hedy Lamarr and Walter Pidgeon and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Set in 1910, it is based on the 1923 London and Broadway hit play by Leon Gordon, which was in turn adapted from the novel Hell's Playground by Ida Vera Simonton...
(1942), and Tortilla Flat
Tortilla Flat (film)
Tortilla Flat is a 1942 film with Spencer Tracy, Hedy Lamarr, John Garfield, Frank Morgan, Akim Tamiroff, and Sheldon Leonard based on the novel by John Steinbeck. It was directed by Victor Fleming.- Plot :...
(1942), based on the novel by John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...
. White Cargo, one of Lamarr's biggest hits at MGM, contains arguably her most famous film quote, "Tondelayo make tiffin". In 1941, she was cast alongside two other Hollywood beauties, Lana Turner
Lana Turner
Lana Turner was an American actress.Discovered and signed to a film contract by MGM at the age of sixteen, Turner first attracted attention in They Won't Forget . She played featured roles, often as the ingenue, in such films as Love Finds Andy Hardy...
and Judy Garland
Judy Garland
Judy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...
in the musical extravaganza Ziegfeld Girl
Ziegfeld Girl (film)
Ziegfeld Girl is a 1941 American film starring James Stewart, Judy Garland, Hedy Lamarr, and Lana Turner, and co-starring Tony Martin, Jackie Cooper, Eve Arden, and Philip Dorn. Released by MGM, it was directed by Robert Z...
.
Lamarr made 18 films from 1940 to 1949 even though she had two children during that time (in 1945 and 1947). After leaving MGM in 1945, she enjoyed her biggest success as Delilah
Delilah
Delilah appears only in the Hebrew bible Book of Judges 16, where she is the "woman in the valley of Sorek" whom Samson loved, and who was his downfall...
in Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil B. DeMille
Cecil Blount DeMille was an American film director and Academy Award-winning film producer in both silent and sound films. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies...
's Samson and Delilah
Samson and Delilah (1949 film)
Samson and Delilah is a 1949 film made by Paramount Pictures , produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr as the title characters...
, the highest-grossing film of 1949, with Victor Mature
Victor Mature
Victor John Mature was an American stage, film and television actor.-Early life:Mature was born in Louisville, Kentucky to an Italian-speaking father from the town Pinzolo, in the Italian part of the former County of Tyrol , Marcello Gelindo Maturi, later Marcellus George Mature, a cutler,...
as the Biblical strongman
Samson
Samson, Shimshon ; Shamshoun or Sampson is the third to last of the Judges of the ancient Israelites mentioned in the Tanakh ....
. However, following her comedic turn opposite Bob Hope
Bob Hope
Bob Hope, KBE, KCSG, KSS was a British-born American comedian and actor who appeared in vaudeville, on Broadway, and in radio, television and movies. He was also noted for his work with the US Armed Forces and his numerous USO shows entertaining American military personnel...
in My Favorite Spy
My Favorite Spy
My Favorite Spy is a 1951 comedy film starring Bob Hope and Hedy Lamarr. The movie was directed by Norman Z. McLeod.-Cast:*Bob Hope as Peanuts White/Eric Augustine*Hedy Lamarr as Lily Dalbray*Francis L...
(1951), her career went into decline. She appeared only sporadically in films after 1950, one of her last roles being that of Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc
Saint Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of Orléans" , is a national heroine of France and a Roman Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France who claimed divine guidance, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, which paved the way for the...
in Irwin Allen
Irwin Allen
Irwin Allen was a television and film director and producer nicknamed "The Master of Disaster" for his work in the disaster film genre. He was also notable for creating a number of television series.- Biography :...
's critically panned epic The Story of Mankind (1957).
Ecstasy and Me
Ecstasy and Me is the tell-all style autobiography of Austrian-born actress and scientist Hedy Lamarr, co-written with Leo Guild and Cy Rice and first published in 1966.-Opening lines:...
(1967) took place about a year after accusations of shoplifting
Shoplifting
Shoplifting is theft of goods from a retail establishment. It is one of the most common property crimes dealt with by police and courts....
, and a year after Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...
's short film Hedy (1966), also known as The Shoplifter. The shoplifting charges coincided with a failed return to the screen in Picture Mommy Dead (1966). The role was ultimately filled by Zsa Zsa Gabor
Zsa Zsa Gabor
Zsa Zsa Gabor is a Hungarian-born American stage, film and television actress.She acted on stage in Vienna, Austria, in 1932, and was crowned Miss Hungary in 1936. She emigrated to the United States in 1941 and became a sought-after actress with "European flair and style", with a personality that...
. Ecstasy and Me begins in a despondent mood, with this reference:
Frequency-hopping spread-spectrum invention
Avant garde composer George AntheilGeorge Antheil
George Antheil was an American avant-garde composer, pianist, author and inventor. A self-described "Bad Boy of Music", his modernist compositions amazed and appalled listeners in Europe and the US during the 1920s with their cacophonous celebration of mechanical devices.Returning permanently to...
, a son of German immigrants and neighbor of Lamarr, had experimented with automated control of musical instruments, including his music for Ballet Mécanique
Ballet mécanique
Ballet Mécanique was a project by the American composer George Antheil and the filmmaker/artists Fernand Léger and Dudley Murphy. Although the film was intended to use Antheil's score as a soundtrack, the two parts were not brought together until the 1990s. As a composition, Ballet Mécanique is...
, originally written for Fernand Léger
Fernand Léger
Joseph Fernand Henri Léger was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of Cubism which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style...
's 1924 abstract film. This score involved multiple player piano
Player piano
A player piano is a self-playing piano, containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism that operates the piano action via pre-programmed music perforated paper, or in rare instances, metallic rolls. The rise of the player piano grew with the rise of the mass-produced piano for the home in...
s playing simultaneously.
Lamarr took her idea to Antheil and together, Antheil and Lamarr submitted the idea of a secret communication system in June 1941. On August 11, 1942, US Patent 2,292,387 was granted to Antheil and "Hedy Kiesler Markey", Lamarr's married name at the time. This early version of frequency hopping used a piano roll
Piano roll
A piano roll is a music storage medium used to operate a player piano, piano player or reproducing piano. A piano roll is a continuous roll of paper with perforations punched into it. The peforations represent note control data...
to change between 88 frequencies and was intended to make radio-guided torpedo
Torpedo
The modern torpedo is a self-propelled missile weapon with an explosive warhead, launched above or below the water surface, propelled underwater towards a target, and designed to detonate either on contact with it or in proximity to it.The term torpedo was originally employed for...
es harder for enemies to detect or jam. Although a presentation of the technique was soon made to the U.S. Navy, it met with opposition and was not adopted.
The idea was not implemented in the USA until 1962, when it was used by U.S. military ships during a blockade of Cuba after the patent had expired. Perhaps owing to this lag in development, the patent was little-known until 1997, when the Electronic Frontier Foundation
Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is an international non-profit digital rights advocacy and legal organization based in the United States...
gave Lamarr an award for this contribution. It is reported that, in 1998, Ottawa wireless technology developer Wi-LAN, Inc. "acquired a 49 percent claim to the patent from Lamarr for an undisclosed amount of stock" (Eliza Schmidkunz, Inside GNSS), although expired patents have no economic value. Antheil had died in 1959.
Lamarr's and Antheil's frequency-hopping idea serves as a basis for modern spread-spectrum communication technology
Spread spectrum
Spread-spectrum techniques are methods by which a signal generated in a particular bandwidth is deliberately spread in the frequency domain, resulting in a signal with a wider bandwidth...
, such as COFDM used in Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi or Wifi, is a mechanism for wirelessly connecting electronic devices. A device enabled with Wi-Fi, such as a personal computer, video game console, smartphone, or digital audio player, can connect to the Internet via a wireless network access point. An access point has a range of about 20...
network connections and CDMA used in some cordless and wireless telephones. Blackwell, Martin, and Vernam's 1920 patent Secrecy Communication System (1598673) seems to lay the communications groundwork for Kiesler and Antheil's patent, which employed the techniques in the autonomous control of torpedoes.
Lamarr wanted to join the National Inventors Council, but was reportedly told by NIC member Charles F. Kettering and others that she could better help the war effort by using her celebrity status to sell War Bonds. She once raised $7,000,000 at just one event.
For several years during the 1990s, the boxes of CorelDRAW
CorelDRAW
CorelDRAW is a vector graphics editor developed and marketed by Corel Corporation of Ottawa, Canada. It is also the name of Corel's Graphics Suite...
's software suites were graced by a large Corel-drawn image of Hedy Lamarr, in tribute to her pre-computer scientific discoveries. These pictures were winners in CorelDRAW's yearly software suite cover design contests. Lamarr sued Corel for using the image without her permission. Corel countered that she did not own rights to the image. They reached an undisclosed settlement in 1999.
Later years
In the ensuing years, Lamarr retreated from public life, and settled in FloridaFlorida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
.
For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Hedy Lamarr has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
at 6247 Hollywood Blvd.
Personal life
Lamarr became a naturalized citizen of the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
on April 10, 1953.
Marriages and romances
She was briefly engaged to German actor Fred Doederlein, and later actor George Montgomery in 1942.Lamarr was married to:
- Friedrich MandlFriedrich MandlFriedrich Mandl was chairman of Hirtenberger Patronen-Fabrik, a leading Austrian armaments firm founded by his father, Alexander Mandl....
(1900–1977), married 1933–1937; chairman of Hirtenberger Patronen-Fabrik, a leading armaments firm founded by his father, Alexander Mandl. Mandl, partially of Jewish descent, was a supporter of AustrofascismAustrofascismAustrofascism is a term which is frequently used by historians to describe the authoritarian rule installed in Austria with the May Constitution of 1934, which ceased with the forcible incorporation of the newly-founded Federal State of Austria into Nazi Germany in 1938...
, although not Nazism. - Gene MarkeyGene MarkeyEugene Willford "Gene" Markey was an American author, producer, screenwriter, and highly decorated naval officer.-Biography:...
(1895–1980), screenwriter and producer, married 1939–1941; son (adopted in 1941, after their divorce), James Lamarr Markey (b. 1939). When Lamarr and Markey divorced – she said they had only spent four evenings alone together in their marriage – the judge advised her to get to know any future husband longer than the four weeks she had known Markey. - John LoderJohn Loder (actor)John Loder was a British-American actor. He was born William John Muir Lowe in London.-Early life:Loder's father was General W. H. M. Lowe, the British officer to whom Patrick Pearse, the leader of the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin, Ireland, surrendered...
(born John Muir Lowe, 1898–1988), actor, married 1943–47; two children: Anthony Loder (b. 1947) and Denise Loder (b. 1945). Loder adopted Hedy's son, James Lamarr Markey, and gave him his surname. James Lamarr Loder later challenged Hedy Lamarr's will in 2000, which did not mention him. He later dropped his suit against the estate in exchange for a reported lump-sum payment of $50,000. Anthony Loder is featured in the European documentary filmDocumentary filmDocumentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
Calling Hedy Lamarr (2004). - Ernest "Ted" StaufferTeddy StaufferErnst Heinrich "Teddy" Stauffer was a Swiss bandleader, musician, actor, nightclub owner, and restaurateur. He was dubbed Germany's "swing-king" of the 1930s.-Early life and career:...
(1909–1991), nightclub owner, restaurateur, and former bandleader, married 1951–1952. - W. Howard Lee (1909–1981), a Texas oilman, married 1953–1960. In 1960, he later married film star Gene TierneyGene TierneyGene Eliza Tierney was an American film and stage actress. Acclaimed as one of the great beauties of her day, she is best remembered for her performance in the title role of Laura and her Academy Award-nominated performance for Best Actress in Leave Her to Heaven .Other notable roles include...
. - Lewis J. Boies (b. 1920), a lawyer (her divorce lawyer), married 1963–1965.
Scandals
In 1965 Lamarr was arrested for shoplifting in Los Angeles; the charges were eventually dropped. In 1991 she was arrested on the same charge in Florida, this time for $21.48 worth of laxatives and eye drops. She pleaded "no contest" to avoid a court appearance, and in return for a promise to refrain from breaking any laws for a year, the charges were once again dropped.According to her autobiography
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...
, Ecstasy and Me (1966), once while running away from Friedrich Mandl, she slipped into a brothel
Brothel
Brothels are business establishments where patrons can engage in sexual activities with prostitutes. Brothels are known under a variety of names, including bordello, cathouse, knocking shop, whorehouse, strumpet house, sporting house, house of ill repute, house of prostitution, and bawdy house...
and hid in an empty room. While her husband searched the brothel, a man entered the room and she had sex with him so she could remain hidden. She was finally successful in escaping when she hired a new maid
Maid
A maidservant or in current usage housemaid or maid is a female employed in domestic service.-Description:Once part of an elaborate hierarchy in great houses, today a single maid may be the only domestic worker that upper and even middle-income households can afford, as was historically the case...
who resembled her; she drugged the maid and used her uniform as a disguise to escape. Lamarr later sued the publisher, saying that many of the anecdote
Anecdote
An anecdote is a short and amusing or interesting story about a real incident or person. It may be as brief as the setting and provocation of a bon mot. An anecdote is always presented as based on a real incident involving actual persons, whether famous or not, usually in an identifiable place...
s in the book, which was described by a judge as "filthy, nauseating, and revolting", were fabricated by its ghost writer, Leo Guild.
Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks is an American film director, screenwriter, composer, lyricist, comedian, actor and producer. He is best known as a creator of broad film farces and comic parodies. He began his career as a stand-up comic and as a writer for the early TV variety show Your Show of Shows...
' popular 1974 comedy film Blazing Saddles
Blazing Saddles
Blazing Saddles is a 1974 satirical Western comedy film directed by Mel Brooks. Starring Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder, the film was written by Brooks, Andrew Bergman, Richard Pryor, Norman Steinberg, and Al Uger, and was based on Bergman's story and draft. The movie was nominated for three...
featured a villain named Hedley Lamarr, who is frequently and inadvertently referred to by other characters as Hedy. In an interview included in the DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
release of the film Brooks says that Hedy Lamarr threatened to sue the producers, believing that the running joke infringed her right of publicity. In one scene, Brooks' character tells the villainous Hedley that "this is 1874 – you'll be able to sue her!" Brooks said they settled out of court for a small sum.
Death
Casselberry, Florida
Casselberry is a city in Seminole County, Florida, United States. The population was 22,629 at the 2000 census. According to the U.S Census estimates of 2009, the city had a population of 24,792...
on January 19, 2000, aged 86, from natural causes. Her son Anthony Loder took her ashes to Austria and spread them in the Vienna Woods, in accordance with her last wishes.
Other
A date with Hedy Lamarr is one of the promises Audrey II tempts Seymour with in the musical Little Shop of HorrorsLittle Shop of Horrors (musical)
Little Shop of Horrors is a rock musical, by composer Alan Menken and writer Howard Ashman, about a hapless florist shop worker who raises a plant that feeds on human blood. The musical is based on the low-budget 1960 black comedy film The Little Shop of Horrors, directed by Roger Corman...
.
Hedy Lamarr is referenced in the film Blazing Saddles
Blazing Saddles
Blazing Saddles is a 1974 satirical Western comedy film directed by Mel Brooks. Starring Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder, the film was written by Brooks, Andrew Bergman, Richard Pryor, Norman Steinberg, and Al Uger, and was based on Bergman's story and draft. The movie was nominated for three...
on a number of occasions.
In 2003, the Boeing
Boeing
The Boeing Company is an American multinational aerospace and defense corporation, founded in 1916 by William E. Boeing in Seattle, Washington. Boeing has expanded over the years, merging with McDonnell Douglas in 1997. Boeing Corporate headquarters has been in Chicago, Illinois since 2001...
corporation ran a series of recruitment ads featuring Hedy Lamarr as a woman of science. No reference to her film career was made in the ads.
In 2005, the first Inventor's Day
Inventor's Day
Inventors' Day is a day of the year set aside by a country to recognise the contributions of inventors. Not all countries recognise Inventors' Day...
in German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
-speaking countries was held in her honor on November 9, on what would have been her 92nd birthday.
The 2010 New York Public Library's exhibit: “Thirty Years of Photography at the New York Public Library” includes a photo of topless Lamarr (ca. 1930) by Austrian-born American photographer Trude Fleischmann.
Filmography
- Das Geld liegt auf der Straße (Money on the Street, 19301930 in film-Events:* November 1: The Big Trail featuring a young John Wayne in his first starring role is released in both 35mm, and a very early form of 70mm film and was the first large scale big-budget film of the sound era costing over $2 million. The film was praised for its aesthetic quality and realism...
) - Die Frau von Lindenau (Storm in a Water Glass, 19311931 in film-Top grossing films:-Academy Awards:*Best Picture: Cimarron - MGM*Best Actor: Lionel Barrymore - A Free Soul*Best Actor: Wallace Beery - The Champ*Best Actor: Fredric March - Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde...
) - Die Abenteuer des Herrn O. F. (The Adventures of Mr. O. F., 1931)
- Man braucht kein Geld (We Need No Money, 19321932 in film-Events:*Cary Grant's film career begins*Katharine Hepburn's film career begins*Shirley Temple's film career begins*Disney released Flowers and Trees, the first cartoon in three-strip Technicolor film.*Santa, first sound film made in Mexico released....
) - Ekstase / Symphonie der Liebe (EcstasyEcstasy (film)Ecstasy – Extase in Czech, Ekstase in German – is a Czech film made in 1933 by the Czech director Gustav Machatý. It stars Hedy Lamarr, credited under her original surname Kiesler, and Zvonimir Rogoz....
, 19331933 in film-Events:* March 2 - King Kong premieres in New York City.* June 6 - The first drive-in theater opens, in Camden, New Jersey.* British Film Institute founded....
) - AlgiersAlgiers (film)Algiers is a 1938 American drama film directed by John Cromwell and starring Charles Boyer, Sigrid Gurie, and Hedy Lamarr. The Walter Wanger production was a remake of the successful 1937 French film Pépé le Moko, which derived its plot from the Henri La Barthe novel of the same name...
(19381938 in filmThe year 1938 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*January — MGM announces that Judy Garland would be cast in the role of "Dorothy" in the upcoming Wizard of Oz motion picture. Ray Bolger is cast as the "Tinman" and Buddy Ebsen is cast as the "Scarecrow". At Bolger's insistence,...
) (download or play it) - Hollywood Goes to Town (1938) (short subject)
- Screen Snapshots: Stars at a Charity Ball (19391939 in filmThe year 1939 in motion pictures can be justified as being called the most outstanding one ever, when it comes to the high quality and high attendance at the large set of the best films that premiered in the year .- Events :Motion picture historians and film often rate...
) (short subject) - Lady of the Tropics (1939)
- I Take This WomanI Take This Woman (1940 film)I Take This Woman is a 1940 drama film starring Spencer Tracy and Hedy Lamarr.-Cast:*Spencer Tracy as Dr. Karl Decker*Hedy Lamarr as Georgi Gragore Decker*Verree Teasdale as Madame "Cesca" Marcesca*Kent Taylor as Phil Mayberry...
(19401940 in filmThe year 1940 in film involved some significant events, including the premieres of the Walt Disney classics Pinocchio and Fantasia.-Events:*February 7 - Walt Disney's animated film Pinocchio is released....
) - Boom TownBoom Town (film)Boom Town is a 1940 adventure drama Hollywood film starring Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Claudette Colbert, Hedy Lamarr, and Frank Morgan. A story written by James Edward Grant in Cosmopolitan magazine titled "A Lady Comes to Burkburnett" provided the inspiration for the film.-Plot:"Big John"...
(1940) - Comrade XComrade XComrade X is a 1940 lighthearted spy movie, starring Clark Gable and Hedy Lamarr and directed by King Vidor.-Plot summary:In the Soviet Union, American reporter McKinley "Mac" Thompson secretly writes unflattering stories, attributed to "Comrade X", for his newspaper...
(1940) - Come Live With MeCome Live with MeCome Live with Me is a 1941 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer romantic comedy film starring James Stewart and Hedy Lamarr, directed by Clarence Brown.-Plot:...
(19411941 in filmThe year 1941 in film involved some significant events.-Events:Citizen Kane, consistently rated as one of the greatest films of all time, was released in 1941.-Top grossing films :-Academy Awards:...
) - Ziegfeld GirlZiegfeld Girl (film)Ziegfeld Girl is a 1941 American film starring James Stewart, Judy Garland, Hedy Lamarr, and Lana Turner, and co-starring Tony Martin, Jackie Cooper, Eve Arden, and Philip Dorn. Released by MGM, it was directed by Robert Z...
(1941) - H.M. Pulham, Esq. (1941)
- Tortilla FlatTortilla Flat (film)Tortilla Flat is a 1942 film with Spencer Tracy, Hedy Lamarr, John Garfield, Frank Morgan, Akim Tamiroff, and Sheldon Leonard based on the novel by John Steinbeck. It was directed by Victor Fleming.- Plot :...
(19421942 in filmThe year 1942 in film involved some significant events, in particular the release of a film consistently rated as one of the greatest of all time, Casablanca.-Events:...
) - CrossroadsCrossroads (1942 film)Crossroads is a 1942 mystery film directed by Jack Conway, starring William Powell, Hedy Lamarr, Claire Trevor and Basil Rathbone. Powell plays a diplomat whose amnesia about his past comes back to trouble him...
(1942) - White CargoWhite CargoWhite Cargo is a film starring Hedy Lamarr and Walter Pidgeon and released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Set in 1910, it is based on the 1923 London and Broadway hit play by Leon Gordon, which was in turn adapted from the novel Hell's Playground by Ida Vera Simonton...
(1942)
- Show Business at WarShow Business at WarShow Business at War is a short film made in 1943 to tout the United States film industry's contribution to the war effort. Several studios collaborated on the production and approximately 70 stars, producers, directors and studio executives appeared in it....
(19431943 in filmThe year 1943 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* January 3 - 1st missing persons telecast * February 20 - American film studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor films....
) (short subject) - The Heavenly BodyThe Heavenly BodyThe Heavenly Body is a 1944 romantic comedy film starring William Powell and Hedy Lamarr. A neglected wife turns to an astrologer, who tells her she will meet and fall in love with a handsome stranger, much to the dismay of her astronomer husband.- Cast :...
(19441944 in filmThe year 1944 in film involved some significant events, including the wholesome, award-winning Going My Way plus popular murder mysteries such as Double Indemnity, Gaslight and Laura.-Events:*July 20 - Since You Went Away is released....
) - The ConspiratorsThe ConspiratorsThe Conspirators is a 1944 film directed by Jean Negulesco. It stars Hedy Lamarr and Paul Henreid.-Cast:*Hedy Lamarr as Irene Von Mohr*Paul Henreid as Vincent Van Der Lyn*Sydney Greenstreet as Ricardo Quintanilla*Peter Lorre as Jan Bernazsky...
(1944) - Experiment PerilousExperiment PerilousExperiment Perilous is a 1944 melodrama set at the turn of the 20th century. The film is based on a novel by Margaret Carpenter and directed by Jacques Tourneur. Albert S. D'Agostino, Jack Okey, Darrell Silvera, and Claude E. Carpenter were nominated for an Academy Award for Best Art...
(1944) - Her Highness and the BellboyHer Highness and the BellboyHer Highness and the Bellboy is a 1945 film starring Hedy Lamarr and Robert Walker.- Plot synopsis :In a fictional European country, a beautiful princess meets a handsome American reporter and falls in love with him. On a trip to New York, she hopes to find him again. While staying at one of the...
(19451945 in filmThe year 1945 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* Paramount Studios releases theatrical short cartoon titled The Friendly Ghost, featuring a ghost named Casper.* With Rossellini's Roma Città aperta, Italian neorealist cinema begins....
) - The Strange WomanThe Strange WomanThe Strange Woman is an American film directed by Edgar G. Ulmer, starring Hedy Lamarr, and released by United Artists. The film is now in the public domain.- Cast :*Hedy Lamarr as Jenny Hager*George Sanders as John Evered...
(19461946 in filmThe year 1946 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*November 21 - William Wyler's The Best Years of Our Lives premieres in New York featuring an ensemble cast including Fredric March, Myrna Loy, Dana Andrews, Teresa Wright, and Harold Russell.*December 20 - Frank Capra's It's a...
) (download or play it) - Dishonored LadyDishonored LadyDishonored Lady is a film starring Hedy Lamarr, Dennis O'Keefe, John Loder, William Lundigan, and Natalie Schafer, directed by Robert Stevenson, and released by United Artists...
(19471947 in filmThe year 1947 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*May 22 - Great Expectations is premiered in New York.*November 24 : The United States House of Representatives of the 80th Congress voted 346 to 17 to approve citations for contempt of Congress against the "Hollywood Ten".*November 25...
) (download or play it) - Let's Live a Little (19481948 in filmThe year 1948 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* Laurence Olivier's Hamlet becomes the first British film to win the American Academy Award for Best Picture.-Top grossing films : After theatrical re-issue- Awards :...
) - Samson and DelilahSamson and Delilah (1949 film)Samson and Delilah is a 1949 film made by Paramount Pictures , produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and starring Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr as the title characters...
(19491949 in filmThe year 1949 in film involved some significant events.-Top grossing films :- Awards :Academy Awards:*Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff, starring Bud Abbott and Lou Costello...
) - A Lady Without PassportA Lady Without PassportA Lady Without Passport is a suspense film directed by Joseph H. Lewis. Shot in semidocumentary style, it is considered film noir.-Plot:...
(19501950 in filmThe year 1950 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* February 15 - Walt Disney Studios' animated film Cinderella debuts.-Top grossing films : After theatrical re-issue- Awards :Academy Awards:*Ambush...
) - Copper CanyonCopper Canyon (film)Copper Canyon is a 1950 film directed by John Farrow. It stars Ray Milland and Hedy Lamarr.-Cast:*Ray Milland as Johnny Carter*Hedy Lamarr as Lisa Roselle*Macdonald Carey as Deputy Lane Travis*Mona Freeman as Caroline Desmond...
(1950) - My Favorite SpyMy Favorite SpyMy Favorite Spy is a 1951 comedy film starring Bob Hope and Hedy Lamarr. The movie was directed by Norman Z. McLeod.-Cast:*Bob Hope as Peanuts White/Eric Augustine*Hedy Lamarr as Lily Dalbray*Francis L...
(19511951 in filmThe year 1951 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* Sweden - May Britt is scouted by Italian film-makers Carlo Ponti and Mario Soldati-Top grossing films : After theatrical re-issue- Awards :Academy Awards:...
) - The Eternal Female (19541954 in filmThe year 1954 in film involved some significant events and memorable ones.-Events:*May 12 - The Marx Brothers' Zeppo Marx divorces wife Marion Benda...
) (unfinished) - Loves of Three Queens (1954)
- The Story of Mankind (19571957 in filmThe year 1957 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* October 21 - The movie Jailhouse Rock, starring Elvis Presley, opens.-Top grossing films : After theatrical re-issue-Awards:...
) - The Female Animal (19581958 in filmThe year 1958 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* February 16- "In the Money" by William Beaudine is released on this date. It would be the last installment of The Bowery Boys series which began back in 1946....
) - Instant KarmaInstant Karma (film)Instant Karma is a 1990 film. Craig Sheffer stars as Zane, a TV producer looking for romance.- Cast :* Craig Sheffer - Zane* Chelsea Noble - Penelope* David Cassidy - Reno* Glenn Hirsch - David* Orson Bean - Dr...
(1990) [archive footage]
External links
- Hedy Lamarr Site
- Hedy Lamarr foundation
- Hedy Lamarr fansite
- Hedy Lamarr at Reel Classics
- Inventions.org page on Hedy Lamarr
- Interview with Hedy Lamarr biographer Patrick Agan
- Advanced Weaponry of the Stars by Prof. Hans-Joachim Braun Invention & Technology article about Hedy Lamarr's patent
- Annual Inventor's Day on her Birthday
- CorelDRAW splash screens
- Calling Hedy Lamarr (2004)
- Photographs and literature