David Sarnoff Research Center

This history celebrates the fascinating process of research and development at the Princeton, NJ lab with stunning photographs selected from thirty thousand stills in RCA's collections. Color television, transistors, lasers, digital memory, computers, liquid-crystal displays, medical electronics, and digital video-these technologies define modern civilization. This visual history tells the story of invention or innovation at this Princeton, New Jersey research facility.The center's engineers, physicists, chemists, technicians, and shop workers developed radar, sonar, and TV-guided missiles during World War II. In 1951, RCA renamed the labs for its visionary leader, David Sarnoff, and the center continued its groundbreaking work for RCA's product divisions and patent-licensing department. General Electric bought RCA in 1986 and donated the David Sarnoff Research Center to SRI International, a nonprofit research institute. Ten years later, the center became Sarnoff Corporation, a company that provides innovative client solutions, licenses patents, starts companies, and sells products. Masterfully framed and lighted, these rare images reflect American confidence in the promise of technology at its twentieth-century peak and illustrate a sometimes unusual world within a social life of awards, gardens, picnics, and sports teams.