Hubert Schlafly

Who was Hubert Schlafly?

Hubert Joseph "Hub" Schlafly Jr. was an American electrical engineer who co-invented the teleprompter. Schlafly is also credited with spearheading the movement towards satellite television within the industry.

Schlafly was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on August 14, 1919. He often moved as a child as his father moved around as a wildcatter. He graduated from St. Louis University High School and later earned a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the University of Notre Dame in 1941.

During the 1950s, Schlafly invented the teleprompter, which scrolls text to on-camera talent, in order to help a soap opera actor who could not remember his lines. Schlafly unveiled the teleprompter on the set of the CBS soap opera, The First Hundred Years, in 1950.

Schlafly and Irving B. Kahn also co-founded the TelePrompTer Corporation, which grew to become the largest cable television provider in the United States by 1973. They later sold the company to Westinghouse.

In addition to the teleprompter, Schlafly is also credited with helping to promote the broadcasting of television signals via a satellite feed. Schlafly and Sidney Topol, who worked for Scientific Atlanta, jointly constructed a portable satellite receiver to obtain satellite signals for specifically for television. He first demonstrated the satellite television technology in 1973, when Speaker of the House Carl Albert was able to speak at a cable television convention in Anaheim, California, from his congressional office in Washington D.C. Schlafly later called the Albert speech via a satellite feed as his greatest contribution to the cable industry.