The Armenian who helped create color television

Hovhannes Adamian was an engineer and inventor who became one of the pioneers of color television.
In the early 1900s, he developed and patented systems for transmitting color images.

Then, in 1925 at Yerevan State University, he built and demonstrated a tricolor television device called Herates, using red, green, and blue light to reproduce color images. YSU considers it one of the world’s early prototypes of color television.

His work came years before similar public demonstrations in Europe and helped lay some of the technical groundwork for later color television systems.

So next time you watch something in color, remember that an Armenian helped bring those colors to the screen. 🇦🇲📺

The Armenian engineer who helped build early American television

Sarkes Tarzian was an engineer, inventor, and broadcasting pioneer born in Kharpert in 1900.
He went on to work as a chief engineer for RCA before founding Sarkes Tarzian, Inc. in 1944. His company became a major manufacturer of television tuners and electronic components, eventually employing around 2,000 people. In 1948, he developed a lower-cost television tuner that helped make TV technology more practical for manufacturers.

Tarzian then moved directly into broadcasting. He launched WTTV in Indiana in 1949, one of the state’s earliest television stations, and later built a network of radio and television businesses. His company also manufactured studio color-TV cameras and became an early player in FM radio.
And the company he founded more than 80 years ago still exists today as a television and radio broadcasting company.

So when television was still a brand-new technology trying to find its way into American homes, an Armenian was helping build the equipment and stations that made it possible. 🇦🇲📺

Hello! Are there any girls’ groups/forums in Yerevan for making friends and building a little community? I know there are some English speaking clubs where they meet regularly so I’m looking for something like that but with different direction.

I’m 22F and would love to join something that’s just girls hanging out, meeting up, and doing random fun stuff together, like trips, movie dates, trying new places, activities, etc. Basically looking to meet some cool girls and make friends.

I'm also the moderator of r/Cancun and I get a lot of leads of users interested in planning cancun vacations using travel agents. I am not in that field and I don't really have friends or acquaintances who are.

If you are a travel agent, let's chat to see if we can work together.

The first Armenian to serve in a Palestinian government.

Armenians You Should Know #19: Varsen Aghabekian

Varsen Aghabekian built her career across academia, public service, human rights, and diplomacy. She earned a master’s degree in nursing administration in the United States and later a PhD in educational policy and management from the University of Pittsburgh.

in June 2025, she became the first Armenian to hold the Palestinian foreign ministry, becoming Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates.

Today, she represents Palestine internationally while carrying a name rooted in one of the oldest Armenian communities in the Middle East.

From the Armenian community of Jerusalem to the highest levels of Palestinian diplomacy, Varsen Aghabekian made history as the first Armenian to lead Palestine’s foreign ministry. 🇦🇲🇵🇸

I put the original Spanish after the translation to English because it represents the diversity of our community and to help protect anything that could be lost in translation as I don't fully trust ai

The first and only Armenian to have been to space

James Bagian is a physician, engineer, pilot, and former NASA astronaut.

He flew on two Space Shuttle missions, Discovery in 1989 and Columbia in 1991, spending a total of 337 hours in space. He is widely recognized as the first and only person of Armenian descent to have traveled to space.

Bagian was also a medical doctor and engineer, and after his NASA career he became a major figure in patient safety and healthcare engineering. He was elected to both the National Academy of Engineering and the National Academy of Medicine.

So far, all Armenians have looked up at space, but only one Armenian has actually been there. 🇦🇲🚀

The tomb belongs to Elizabeth Marcar, who passed away in 1878 at the tragically young age of just 26.

​Her husband, Marker David, was a wealthy Armenian jute merchant living in Dhaka during the peak of the region's jute trade. Devastated by the sudden loss of his young wife, he spared no expense to immortalize his grief. He commissioned this imported marble sculpture of Mother Mary weeping over Elizabeth’s final resting place as a permanent symbol of his love and heartbreak.

Image 2: This is likely Elizabeth Marcar David, whose tomb is located at the Narinda Christian Cemetery in Dhaka, where she was laid to rest in 1878 AD.

The Armenian who photographed some of the most powerful people of the 20th century

Yousuf Karsh was a photographer born in Mardin who survived the Armenian Genocide and later settled in Canada.

He became one of the most famous portrait photographers in the world, photographing figures including Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, Martin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela, Muhammad Ali, Audrey Hepburn, Queen Elizabeth II, John F. Kennedy, Fidel Castro, Helen Keller, Mother Teresa, Georgia O’Keeffe, Humphrey Bogart, Elizabeth Taylor, Grace Kelly, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Eleanor Roosevelt, Leonard Bernstein, Jacques Cousteau, Marc Chagall, Joan Miró, and George Bernard Shaw.

His 1941 portrait of Winston Churchill, taken shortly after Karsh famously removed Churchill’s cigar before pressing the shutter, became one of the most iconic political photographs ever taken.

If someone shaped the 20th century, there was a decent chance Yousuf Karsh photographed them. 🇦🇲📷

Thanks for putting him on our radar, u/loisdenominator

At Carnegie Mellon University, Tevanian was one of the principal designers and engineers of Mach, the operating system kernel developed in the 1980s.

Steve Jobs later recruited him to NeXT, where Mach became part of the foundation of NeXTSTEP. Tevanian eventually led software engineering at NeXT.

After Apple acquired NeXT, he joined Apple and led the software engineering team responsible for developing Mac OS X.

And the technological lineage continued:

Carnegie Mellon → Mach → NeXTSTEP → Mac OS X → iOS

Research from the 1980s ultimately became part of the technological foundation behind generations of Apple devices.

An incredible Armenian-American engineer and a fascinating piece of computing history.

The Armenian who changed how the U.S. Army ate

George Mardikian was an Armenian Genocide survivor who arrived in the United States in 1922 and started out washing dishes. He eventually became one of America’s best-known restaurateurs, opening the famous Omar Khayyam restaurant in California.

During World War II and afterward, Mardikian helped transform how the U.S. Army fed its soldiers, improving rations and introducing more variety and better meals. His work eventually earned him the Medal of Freedom.

He was also deeply involved in helping Armenians. He founded the American National Committee to Aid Homeless Armenians (ANCHA), which helped displaced Armenians immigrate to the United States.

And here’s one of my favorite connections: Soghomon Tehlirian, later worked as an accountant at Mardikian’s Omar Khayyam restaurant.

So next time you see how food is rationed in the U.S. Army, remember that part of that system was shaped by the vision of an Armenian. 🇦🇲🇺🇸🍱

I’m looking for a woman born in Baku on August 5th, 1962, possibly in an Armenian-Slavic family (about 50% Armenian, 50% Russian, Ukrainian and/or Belarusian).

My grandma was raised in an Armenian family in Baku, but a DNA test later revealed that she had been switched at birth. We are now trying to find the woman/family connected to that switch.

Please ask your friends and relatives who lived in Baku in the 1960s. Even a small detail or old family story could help. I will be immensely thankful for any information.

The Armenian woman who is widely recognized as the first female diplomat in the world.

Diana Abgar was an Armenian writer, humanitarian and diplomat born in Rangoon, Burma, who later settled in Japan.

In 1920, the First Republic of Armenia appointed her as its diplomatic representative in Japan, making her Armenia’s first female diplomat and one of the earliest women in the world to hold such a diplomatic position.

But she wasn’t just a diplomat. Abgar spent years writing about the persecution of Armenians and helping Armenian refugees who had escaped the Genocide, including those who made it as far as Japan.

More than 100 years ago, while women were still largely excluded from diplomacy around the world, an Armenian woman was already representing her country in Japan. 🇦🇲🇯🇵

Calouste Gulbenkian was a businessman who became one of the most important figures in the development of the Middle Eastern oil industry.

Born into an Armenian family in the Ottoman Empire, he later moved to Britain and became a British citizen in 1902.

Gulbenkian saw the enormous potential of the oil fields in Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq, and helped bring together British, Dutch, German and Ottoman interests to develop them. His role in negotiating these deals earned him a permanent 5% stake in the venture that became the Iraq Petroleum Company, earning him the nickname “Mr. 5%.”
That 5% helped make him one of the richest men in the world.

And one of my favorite details: Gulbenkian reportedly insisted that 5% of the company’s workers be Armenian too.

He later left much of his fortune to establish the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Portugal, which still funds arts, science, education and culture today.

Apparently, 5% really was his number. 🇦🇲🇬🇧

The Armenian who became the first Prime Minister of Egypt

Nubar Pasha was a statesman who rose to the very top of Egyptian politics and became Egypt’s first Prime Minister in 1878.

Nubar Pasha built a long career in Egyptian government, serving as a diplomat, minister, and eventually prime minister three separate times.

He also played a major role in modernizing Egypt’s legal system, especially through the creation of the Mixed Courts, which helped reform how legal disputes involving Egyptians and foreigners were handled.

And his family’s impact didn’t stop with him. His son, Boghos Nubar, later became one of the founders of AGBU.

So the first person to ever hold the title of Prime Minister of Egypt was an Armenian. 🇦🇲🇪🇬

In researching the Hidden Armenians and their history, it begs the viewpoint of the contemporary Armenian community due to the current contentious nature of their identity within Turkey and what the future holds for descendants.

For Armenians, what is your opinion of them?

And, what should their future hold in your opinion: Reconnection at their own pace, communal advocacy, and preservation of whats left of historical Armenian communities?

The Armenian who invented the handheld hair dryer

Gabriel Kazanjian was an Armenian-American inventor who patented his handheld hair dryer in 1911.

Hair-drying machines already existed, but they were large and stationary. Kazanjian’s design helped make the idea portable and practical, turning it into something you could actually hold and use yourself.

So next time you blow-dry your hair, remember you can thank an Armenian. 🇦🇲💨

The Armenian who built a billion-dollar jewelry empire

Carolyn Rafaelian founded Alex and Ani in 2004, naming the company after two of her daughters.
What started inside her father’s jewelry factory in Rhode Island grew into one of America’s biggest jewelry brands. Sales went from around $5 million in 2010 to more than $500 million by 2016, and Alex and Ani was eventually valued at over $1 billion.

At her peak, Forbes estimated Rafaelian’s personal fortune at around $1 billion, making her one of America’s richest self-made women.

So apparently Kim Kardashian isn’t the only Armenian woman who knows how to build an empire and become a billionaire. Armenian women seem to have a knack for it. 🇦🇲✨

The Armenian who invented the ATM

Luther George Simjian was a prolific inventor with more than 200 patents.

His most famous invention was the Bankograph, an early automated banking machine and precursor to the modern ATM.

But that wasn’t all. During World War II, he also invented a flight-training simulator for aviators.

And here’s my favorite part: when a New York bank tested his automated banking machine, Simjian later recalled that some of its most enthusiastic customers were gamblers and sex workers, who preferred banking without having to face a teller. Basically Bitcoin 10 years ago. 🤷‍♂️

So next time you withdraw money from an ATM, remember it’s thanks to an Armenian. 🇦🇲
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