John Vincent Lawless Hogan was born on February 14, 1890 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. He was the son of John Lawless Hogan and Louise Eleanor Shimer. While still a boy he became interested in wireless telegraphy and built his own station in 1902.
Hogan received a Ph. D. in 1899 from the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale. He also studied electrical physics and mathematics at Yale in 1908-1910.
In 1908 Hogan became chief laboratory assistant to Lee De Forest, the radio pioneer who invented the triode electronic amplifier. Hogan, who, according to De Forest, already possessed a "rich bass voice suitable for broadcasting, " participated in one of the earliest radiotelephone experiments at De Forest's laboratory and assisted De Forest during the first public demonstration of the audio (triode) detector at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences in March 1907.
He was permitted to investigate the sensitivity of crystal detectors of wireless waves by using the facilities of the graduate physics laboratory. Hogan's first published paper, "Inductance Coils Used in Wireless Telegraphy, " appeared in Electrical World (1909). His research led to his first patent, on a crystal detector, issued in 1910. He published an analysis of wireless detectors in Electrical World in 1911.
Hogan's most important invention, single-dial tuning of radio receivers, was patented in 1912 (patent no. 1, 014, 002), after he had joined the National Electric Signaling Co. , a pioneer American wireless firm founded by Reginald Fessenden. He remained with the company and its successor, International Radio Telegraph Co. , until 1921. Hogan participated in the acceptance tests of a powerful transmitter built for the U. S. Navy by National Electric Signaling and installed at Arlington, Virginia. In a paper published in 1913, he gave the quantitative results of reception from Arlington aboard the U. S. S. Salem and stated that at night communication had been possible as far as Gibraltar.
In 1912 Hogan, Robert H. Marriott, and Alfred N. Goldsmith founded the Institute of Radio Engineers. Hogan had earlier been a member of the Society of Wireless Telegraph Engineers (popularly known as the "Swatties"), which had merged with the Wireless Institute to form the Institute of Radio Engineers. He was vice-president of the latter during 1916-1919 (the only man to serve in that capacity for more than one year) and was president in 1920. During World War I, Hogan was a frequent contributor to Electrical World and the Proceedings of the Institute of Radio Engineers. He visited the German transmitting stations at Sayville, New York, and Tuckerton, New Jersey, in 1914 and reported that the operators had been able to communicate by radio directly with Germany after their transatlantic cable was cut by the British. In the same year Hogan reported on experiments with radio communication to moving trains, Guglielmo Marconi's station at New Brunswick, New Jersey, and French experiments using the Eiffel Tower as an antenna. In an IRE paper published in 1916, he discussed the necessary specifications for a radio system that would be as reliable as a wire telegraph system. During the war he designed military radio apparatus.
In 1921 he opened a consulting engineering practice, his clients including the Westinghouse Electric Company, Atwater Kent, and commercial radio stations. Hogan was especially interested in the problem of channel allocation and interference among stations. His suggestions for coping with the problem were included in an IRE paper published in 1929. In 1928 Hogan turned his attention to new forms of communication, including television and facsimile. He used his own experimental broadcasting station, W2XR, to test his inventions, a number of which led to patents. He was attracted by the high-fidelity potential of frequency modulation and in 1936 converted his experimental station to WQXR.
During World War II, Hogan was a special assistant to Vannevar Bush, director of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, with responsibility for the development of radar and proximity fuses. After 1945 he resumed his consulting work and also his research on facsimile transmission systems. Hogan died in Forest Hills, New York.
Hogan had been long recognized in the trades as an innovator and pioneer in broadcasting. His most important invention was single-dial tuning of radio receivers. WQXR, the pioneer high-fidelity station in New York City. This experimental broadcasting station, W2XR, later WQXR, became known for its quality programming, especially of classical music.
Hogan was a member of the Society of Wireless Telegraph Engineers.
In 1917 Hogan married Edith McLennan Schrader; they had one son.
