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Great Australians you should know: Henry Sutton

May 01, 2017

The whole world knows John Logie Baird invented television, don’t they? Ah, but did he? There is credible evidence to show Henry Sutton of Ballarat had done so, sometime before Baird was born.

Henry came into the world in a tent in the Victorian goldfields in 1856, one of six children to Richard and Mary Sutton. Richard had been a miner but found a more certain income providing entertainment by playing his squeezebox, before later establishing a business manufacturing musical instruments. All the family – other than Henry – went on to build the successful and greatly respected music business, Suttons, in Ballarat and Melbourne.

Henry’s mother taught him at home until he was 11 years old; beyond that he was generally self-educated. Even at a young age, he developed an avid interest in things mechanical and electrical. His ability to develop world-leading products became evident from his early teens. When just 14, he designed a practical ring armature that allowed him to make a continuous current dynamo. Although a similar device was patented by Pacinotti ten years earlier, it was barely practical; the youthful Sutton’s device became the accepted standard. Just three years later, when it was discovered its operation could be reversed, the invention became suited for use as an electric motor as well as a generator.

There were so many inventions to come from Henry Sutton it would take a book to cover them all in detail. In brief, some of them included:

An orthicopter, a mechanical device that copied the flight of birds and could fly in a circle or up and down. It was greatly admired by Lawrence Hargrave, the man who inspired much of the Wright brothers’ work in the development of flight.
Photolithography and a colour printing process, transferring an image from a gelatine plate onto a permanent surface.
An accumulator, or storage battery.
A water-powered vacuum pump so successful it was adopted by the Swan Edison company in England for the manufacture of light bulbs.
A telephone network between his family’s warehouse and retail premises in Ballarat. Alexander Graeme Bell visited Australia to spend time with him, checking out and taking note of his system. Henry invented some 20 different forms of the telephone – including a compact device with microphone and speaker at either end, the first handset – sixteen of them subsequently patented by others. (Henry rarely patented an invention, believing they ought to benefit mankind without the restrictions imposed by patents. He did not care for personal material gain.)
A long-distance wireless transmission system, and the world’s first portable radio, with a range of about 450 metres.

The invention for which Henry Sutton deserves the greatest kudos – assuming some of its better uses, perhaps – is television, although the name applied to it at the time was Telephane. With his love of physics and his understanding of Nipkow discs and Nicol prisms, Henry created transmitter and receiver devices allowing him to transmit pictures of the 1885 Melbourne Cup to Ballarat. The test was only partially successful, mainly due to the telegraph system of the day having insufficient bandwidth. Nonetheless, three years before the ‘father of television’ was born, an Australian transmitted pictures from one city to another.

The principle was approved by Victorian Astronomer General, Robert Lewis Ellery. Henry took the Telephane overseas, demonstrating it in England, Europe and the United States. Scientists saw it in operation and, understanding its potential, lauded its inventor. He wrote and published a paper on the system and the method of synchronisation between transmitter and receiver but again failed to take out a patent. This allowed Baird to use the principles and claim television as his own invention. It seems, at times, the Sutton altruism paid great dividends to others.

Beyond designing and developing electronic and mechanical devices (which included cars and motorcycles), Henry Sutton lectured at the Ballarat School of Mines, developed a radio broadcast transmitter at a family home in Melbourne, initiated Victoria’s scientific instrument manufacturing industry, and helped originate the Automobile Club of Victoria. Industrious to the end, he frequently worked through the night, surprised when a new day was upon him. Sad to note, he died in 1912 of chronic nephritis at the young age of 56.

So there you are. When next asked in a pub quiz who invented television, you have a sound argument in saying Henry Sutton, not Logie Baird. Are you game?