Society History

To appreciate the importance of the MTT Society, one has to go back to the early period of radio development. Beginning with Guglielmo Marconi’s wireless telegraphy experiments in 1895-1896, what was originally called “wireless” telegraphy became radio with the electrical amplification possibilities inherent in the vacuum tubes that evolved from John Fleming’s diode and Lee de Forest’s triode. In 1912, a new society, called the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE) was founded. The IRE was devoted to radio, and then broadly to electronics.

In 1950s, most of the microwave people knew each other. They were all more or less familiar with the companies that were doing business in the field. In those days, the big event of the year for technical people was the IRE Convention, which was held in the spring in New York every year. The purpose of the IRE Convention at the time was to have technical meetings. The exhibits were an attachment to those technical meetings. Many of colleagues who were active in microwaves at the time would go to the IRE Convention and attend all of the meetings relative to microwaves. They would also visit other companies in the exhibit hall. There was usually a cocktail party and sometimes a formal dinner for attendees.

The Convention provided an opportunity for microwave people to get together, since most of attendees were members of the IRE at the time.

In 1948, the IRE recognized the need for forming smaller, more compact groups on the basis of professional interest. In March of that year, they adopted the Professional Group principle of operation. In 1951, at the National Convention in New York,”, Ben Warriner IV, who was a microwave engineer with General Precision Laboratories in Pleasantville, NY, had a discussion with Larry Cummings, who was the IRE Technical Secretary, on the possibility of promoting a Professional Group for Microwave Electronics.

Although there was a lack of enthusiasm at headquarters, Ben circulated a letter dated July 9, 1951 to a group that he addressed as “members of the IRE interested in forming a professional group for microwave electronics.”

The members of the first committee, which had its first meeting on May 1, 1952, included Ben Warriner as Chairman, Andre Clavier as Vice Chairman, and Bill Mumford as Secretary-Treasurer. The other members of the committee included Paul Coleman, Don King, Harry Marvin, Joe McCann, George Rosselot, Harald Schutz, and George Southworth. They started out as “IRE Professional Group on Microwave and Electronics”. During the same meeting, the name was changed to “Professional Group on Microwave Theory and Techniques”.

By January 1953, the group had a total membership of 942, of whom 471 had paid their dues. The annual dues at that time was $2.

In March 1953, one issue of the TRANSACTIONS was published. It consisted of 48 pages and was made up of 13 articles and one abstract.

The TRANSACTIONS started out with one issue the first year, three the second year, and six the third year. It was a quarterly for several years, until 1959. Starting in 1960, it was published every other month, and in 1966, monthly publications began.

The TRANSACTIONS was retitled from “IRE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques” to “IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques” in 1963 due to the name change of IEEE.

Became “IEEE Professional Technical Group on Microwave Theory and Techniques”.

1974 – It became “IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society”. (Approved at Sept. 10, *1973 AdCom meeting, and approved by Board of Directors shortly thereafter).