"The Father of Radio
Broadcasting", Reginald Fessenden, the eldest son of an Anglican Minister, was born
in 1866 in East
From his home in Fergus, Ontario, Fessenden closely followed the work of Alexander Graham Bell Bell, and he never forgot his dream of transmitting words without wires. When he was only 10 years old, Reginald watched Bell demonstrate the telephone in his lab in Brantford, Ontario and later make the first long distance phone call in history, from Paris to Brantford, Ontario. Few people shared Fessenden's belief that broadcasting voices was possible. When he asked the opinion of the great Thomas Edison, Edison replied, "Fezzie, what do you say are man's chances of jumping over the moon? I think one is as likely as the other." - - - Edison was wrong. It took six years for Fessenden to refine his invention but, on Christmas Eve 1906,
Fessenden made the first radio broadcast in history.
Discovering a way to broadcast human voice by radio is only one of Fessenden's accomplishments - during his life he came up with over 500 other inventions including the Fathometer or depth finder which are reflected in the words of the memorial above the vault of Fessenden's final resting place (see top photo) on the island of Bermuda.
There is lots more to read on Fessenden:
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Bolton
(near Sherbrooke), Quebec. His boyhood years were spent in Ontario - first in Fergus
(north of Guelph) and later in Niagara Falls. 
Radio operators on ships in the Atlantic were shocked to hear
a human voice emitting from the equipment they used to receive Morse code. Many operators
called their Captains to the radio room, where they heard Fessenden make a short speech,
play a record, and give a rendition of "O Holy Night" on his violin.