Career
When Marion met Edwin Armstrong she was the secretary of David Sarnoff then an executive at Radio Corporation of America. Armstrong was then both an inventor and Professor of Electrical Engineering at Columbia University. He had sold his patents for the autodyne (regenerative circuit) and superheterodyne receiver to Westinghouse, which then owned Radio Corporation of America, making him a millionaire, and owner of a large block of Radio Corporation of America stock. Marion was described as "tall and strikingly handsome".
Armstrong built Marion what was described as "the world"s first portable radio".
He bought her a Hispano-Suiza sports car as a wedding gift, when they wed in 1923. By 1933, Edwin Armstrong had filed key patents for techniques he developed that were to eventually make FM Radio successful.
His professional relationship with Marion"s former boss, Sarnoff, fractured when Sarnoff who was by then the President of Radio Corporation of America, concluded the development of FM Radio was not in the best interests of Radio Corporation of America, which operated an extensive network of commercial Department of Administration and Management Radio stations. Radio Corporation of America and over a dozen other electronics firms including Motorola ended up filing competing patents for FM Radio.
These protracted patent fights brought Armstrong to the brink of financial ruin.
According to "They made America" Armstrong was oblivious to the toll his struggle was taking on Marion. Marion spent months in a mental hospital after she threw herself into the East River. Finally, on November 1, 1953, Edwin told Marion that he had used up almost all his financial resources.
In better times funds for their retirement was put in her name, and he asked her to release a portion of those funds, so he could continue the legal battles.
She declined, and suggested he consider accepting a settlement. Enraged, Edwin picked up a fireplace poker, and swung at her.
Marion left the apartment, and never saw him again. After just under three months of separation, on January 31, 1954, Armstrong wrote Marion an apology and threw himself from his high-rise apartment.
Marion established the Armstrong Memorial Research Foundation.
Marion died on August 8, 1979(1979-1908-08), in New Hampshire, where she had made her home.