John Logie Baird played a key role in popularising television in Britain.
He grew up in Glasgow under the watchful eye of his father, a Presbyterian minister, and followed his father's strict Calvinist approach to work. In 1914, he moved to London to look for work, having successfully completed his electrical engineering diploma.
Baird was forced to give up business in 1922 after a serious illness, but this meant he could focus purely on his inventions. He unveiled the 'Televisor', an experimental television device, to fascinated spectators at the Selfridges department store, in 1924 and transmitted the fuzzy image of a ventriloquist dummy's head. The following year, he bribed a frightened office boy, William Taynton, to become the first human seen on TV.
