Local Inventors Join Hall of Fame

Medical kits, small batteries, among advances being honored

By Tracy Robinson
Coastal Monmouth bureau

February 22, 2002

Their inventions made a difference during medical emergencies, made storing energy in. small spaces possible and improved the reception of television signals.

Four Monmouth County residents were among a dozen inventors inducted into the New Jersey Inventors Hall of Fame last night in Newark, honored for their ingenuity at the annual award ceremony at the New Jersey Institute of Technology.

'These are people who did something unbelievable and opened up whole new vistas", said Harry Roman, chairman of the board of the Hall of Fame. "They are people who really change our world."

Scientific and technological advances contribute to 60 percent of the growth of the U.S economy, Raman said.

Most of those honored, including" Antoni S. Gozdz, 52 of the Wayside section of Tinton Falls, conceived their ideas while working for companies in their respective fields.

At Telecordia Technologies Inc. in Red Bank, Gozdz said that he and his coworkers, Jean-Marie Tarascon and Paul C. Warren, conducted extensive research that resulted in more efficient and smaller batteries.

Their plastic lithium rechargeable battery powers things such as laptop computers, cell phones and DVD players. The demand for small find lightweight batteries is driven by the continuing evolution of consumer electronics, Gozdz said.

With 51 patents to his name, Isaac S. Blonder of Shrewsbury made his mark mostly in the field of television reception. Before the 1950s, Blonder, 85, a former physics teacher, and his business Partner. Ben Tongue, were engineers for an electronics manufacturer.

Then they started their own company. "Blonder-Tongue", and pioneered the design of television equipment.

"When, television first started stations were scattered all over and reception wasn't good", Blonder said.

"We designed a broadband booster that amplified all the channels so you didn't have to tune (each channel)." Blonder said, noting prior to their invention, televisions were difficult for the average viewer to tune.

Yet one creative mind honored yesterday, Dave Hammond of Ocean Township, got his idea while on the line of duty. Hammond said while he was a Navy medic during the Vietnam War he realized how hard it was for young and inexperienced corpsman to remember the medical training they had received and "assimilate it on the spot" under the stress of battle.

The situation of having to figure out what medical supplies to use and how to use them during a stateside emergency is also stressful, he said about how he came up with the idea for intelligent first aid kits.

The Patented kits color code the medical supplies needed according to the type of medical emergency and also included cards that tell the first-aid giver what to do.

In most traditional first aid kits the supplies are $simply packed in there, said Hammond, explaining how daunting this can be during and emergency for someone with little or no medical training.

"So when you have an emergency you don't have to scramble around," he said.

Herwig Kogelnik who did not attend the ceremony, was honored for his work at the former Bell Laboratories in Holmdel where his research focused on lasers and optoelectronics.

Isaac S. Blonder of Shrewsbury with an amplifier he helped invent.