Roy Alexander Weagant

Who was Roy Alexander Weagant?

Roy Alexander Weagant was a noted Canadian-American radio pioneer.

Weagant was born in Morrisburg, Ontario, and at age 4 moved to Derby Line, Vermont. He attended preparatory school and college in Stanstead, Quebec, then McGill University, Montreal, where he saw demonstrations by Sir Ernest Rutherford, and from which he graduated with a BS degree in 1905. After graduation he worked in turn for the Montreal Light and Power Company, the Western Electric Company in New York City and then Pittsburgh, the General Electric Company at West Lynn, Massachusetts, and in 1907 the DeLaval Steam Turbine Company at Trenton, New Jersey.

When Reginald Fessenden contracted with the company for a steam turbine, Weagant applied for a job, and from 1908-1915 worked at Fessenden's National Electric Signaling Company's station at Brant Rock, Massachusetts, working on the design of the 100-kilowatt spark transmitter for the United States Navy's first high-power station at Arlington, Virginia.

In 1915, Weagant joined the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company of America as a designer, and subsequently became its chief engineer.