Paul Gottlieb Nipkow
Entrepreneur
Best remembered for inventing a TV transmission device known as the Nipkow disk, this Prussian-born inventor ushered in the modern entertainment era.
In his early years, he studied various sub-fields of physics under the prominent scientists Adolf Slaby and Hermann von Helmholtz.
Berlin's first public television station, Fernsehsender Paul Nipkow, was named in Nipkow's honor.
A native of Lauenburg, Prussia (modern-day Poland), he was born into a family of Polish Kashubian heritage.
In 1925, John Logie Baird became the first person to successfully produce television images using Nipkow's invention.