In the late 1500s, a large powerful gun was placed on top of the Signal Hill, in Newfoundl

In the late 1500s, a large powerful gun was placed on top of the Signal Hill, in Newfoundland, to prevent attacks from the outside. Flags were also flown there to warn sailors of bad weather. It’s fitting, then, the Italian Gulielmo Marconi should have chosen this site (场所) to receive the world’s first radio signal ― in Morse code ― from England on December 12, 1901.

    Marconi, combining earlier ideas with his own, led us to a new communications age. For the next 50 years, until the appearance of television, radio ruled the air waves.

    Today, it’s the TV that rules. No single person can say to have invented television.

    In 1884, the German Paul Nipkow invented a device (设备) that sent pictures mechanically (机械地), and in 1906, Boris Rosing, a Russian, used a ray and a disc to create the world’s first TV system. Then in the early 1920s, another Russian, Vladimir Zworykin，invented a picture display tube. He took out a patent (专利) for color TV, even though it wouldn’t be developed for another 25 years.

    In 1924, a Scot entered the scene ― John Logie Baird. He first succeeded in sending a moving picture and a year later got the first actual TV picture. In 1926, Baird showed TV in a London laboratory. Two years later in New York, Felix the Cat became the first TV star.

TV excited everyone’s imagination, but hardly anyone had a set, with just two thousand in use worldwide in the mid-1930s.

Since the late 1940s, TV technology has developed very quickly. Computers may finally be combined with all televisions to give people a total all-in-one communications network.

Today, it’s possible to sit and watch TV in the middle of a forest or in the Arctic. It’s surprising when one considers that Marconi was on Signal Hill in the same century.

73．We can learn from the text that Signal Hill was once used as _________.

A．a site of communication                    B．a weather station

C．a factory to produce weapons            D．a battle field to fight enemies from the outside

74．When the writer says that today it is the TV that rules, he means that the TV _________.

    A．has led to a new communications age

    B．is a major means of today’s communication

    C．is a device invented with ideas from Marconi

    D．has replaced the radio in today’s communication

75．What is the main idea of Paragraphs 4 and 5 ?

    A．London is the place where TV is invented．

    B．John Logie Baird was the chief inventor of television．

    C．A number of people contributed to the invention of television．

    D．Russian scientists played an important role in the invention of television．

76．The writer believes that the day will come when _________.

    A．the future computers will be able to do the work TV is now doing

    B．the future computers will become available to everyone in the world

    C．the future computers will be connected to create one international network

    D．the future computers will take the place of televisions and radios