"Solar Energy" Mária Telkes Hand Signed FDC Dated 1948 For Sale

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"Solar Energy" Mária Telkes Hand Signed FDC Dated 1948:
$499.99

Up for sale "Solar Energy" Mária Telkes Hand Signed First Day Cover Dated 1948. 

1900 – December 2, 1995) was a Hungarian-American biophysicist, scientist and

inventor who worked on solar energy technologies. Telkes

is considered one of the founders of solar thermal storage systems, earning her

the nickname "the Sun Queen". She

was a prolific inventor of practical thermal devices, including a miniature

desalination unit (solar still) for use on

lifeboats, which used solar power and condensation to collect potable water.

The still saved the lives of airmen and sailors who would have been without

water when abandoned at sea. She

moved to Texas in the 1970s and consulted with a variety of start-up solar

companies, including Northrup Solar, which subsequently became ARCO Solar, and

eventually BP Solar. Born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1900 to Aladar and Maria Laban

de Telkes, Maria attended elementary and high school in Budapest. She then

studied at the University of Budapest, graduating with a B.A. in physical

chemistry in 1920 and a PhD in 1924. When

she moved to the United States in 1925, she visited a relative who was the

Hungarian consul in Cleveland, Ohio. There, she was hired to work in at the

Cleveland Clinic Foundation to investigate the energy produced by living

organisms. Telkes did some research while working at the foundation, and under

the leadership of George Crile, they invented a photoelectric mechanism that

could record brain waves and also worked to write a book called Phenomenon

of Life. Telkes

worked as a biophysicist in the United States; and, from 1939 to 1953, she was

involved in solar energy research at Massachusetts

Institute of Technology. During World War II, the United States

government, noting Telkes's expertise, recruited her to serve as a civilian

advisor to the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD). There,

she developed a solar-powered water desalination machine. It came to be one of

her most notable inventions because it helped soldiers get clean water in

difficult situations and also helped solve water problems in the US Virgin

Islands. In

1948, she started working on the Dover Sun House; she teamed up with

architect Eleanor Raymond, with the

project financed by philanthropist and sculptor Amelia Peabody. The system was

designed so that a special salt would melt in the sun, trap the heat and then

release it once it cooled and hardened. The system worked with the sunlight

passing through glass windows, which would heat the air inside the glass. This

heated air then passed through a metal sheet into another air space. From

there, fans moved the air to a storage compartment filled with the salt (sodium sulfate). These compartments were in between the walls,

heating the house as the salt cooled. In addition to this, she received a grant

by the Ford Foundation of $45,000 to develop a solar-powered oven so people who

lack the technology around the world be able to heat things. The criteria for

this project was that the oven needed to be able to get as high as 350 degrees,

and needed to be easy to use. The result was an innovation that worked even

better than anticipated. It was useful for tribal Indian usage in remote

reservations. There were extra safety features so that children could use them.

While she invented the solar oven, she also discovered a better way for farmers

to dry their crops using the same technology. This technology was extremely

important for society as a whole and is still used today. Later in 1980,

she helped the US Department of Energy to develop and build the first fully

solar-powered home. She received multiple awards for her work, and over the

course of her career, earned more than 20 patents. One

of her specialties was phase-change materials, including molten salts to store

thermal energy. One of her materials of choice was Glauber's salt (sodium

sulfate). 

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