What's in a Prague street name

Murgašova was built in 1969.

Jozef Murgaš was born in Tajov, near Banská Bystrica in Slovakia, in 1864 (photo taken from Wikimedia Commons, credit to Peter Zelizňák).

Having finished his schooling in Banská Bystrica, he went to Bratislava to study at the seminary from 1880 to 1882, then moving to Esztergom (now in Hungary) to complete his studies at the seminary there.

Ordained as a priest in 1888, he continued his studies, with two years studying painting in Budapest, and another four at Munich’s Academy of Fine Arts. This is one of his paintings, Veduta.

In 1896, Murgaš moved to the USA, settling in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where he developed his interest in electrical engineering.

By 1904, the United States Patent and Trademark Office had granted him two patents: one for an ‘Apparatus for Wireless Telegraphy’, another for a ‘Method of Communicating Messages by Wireless Telegraphy’.

A joint stock company, Universal Aether Telegraph Co., was set up in Philadelphia in 1907 to make use of Murgaš’s inventions.

Many other patents would follow, including an electric transformer (1907), wireless telegraphy (1909) and a fishing reel (1912). An antenna system he developed would enable messages to be exchanged between Wilkes-Barre and Scranton, 30 kilometres away.

During World War One, Murgaš heavily promoted the idea of a joint state for Czechs and Slovaks. He raised over a million dollars from Slovak émigrés, and was one of the signatories of the Pittsburgh Agreement on 31 May 1918 (photo is my own).

Murgaš returned to Slovakia in 1920, but, after the authorities stopped him from getting a post as a teacher of electrical engineering, he headed back to Wilkes-Barre, where he died in 1929.