The Lansing Legacy is for ALTEC, JBL, and UREI too!

Let's go back a little further, Bell Laboratories.

Probably a little realistic bio on Dr J.K Hilliard, the actual engineer who mentored these other names so lovingly inflated to larger than life scale wouldn't hurt either. I mean, if we wanted to be truly comprehensive about it. :)
I’m very impressed by the Fletcher System (especially for it’s time). I enjoy learning about the history of these projects and the people behind them. It helps me better understand and appreciate where we are today.
 
Hilliard is the Zeus of the great Southern California Horn Gods. Or the Wotan if you’re German.
He was also apparently a close personal friend of Dr Blackburn.

For those who don't know who Blackburn is, he is actually the engineer responsible for many of the early significant creations that bear Jim Lansing's name.

I’m very impressed by the Fletcher System (especially for it’s time). I enjoy learning about the history of these projects and the people behind them.
The Shearer horn is where it all begins for me.

Every time i see and hear the Lion roar i am reminded of those 3 fellas from MGM, Dr Hilliard, Douglas Shearer, and Robert Stephens, who's contributions continue to bless my audio world today.
 
Shearer ran the best sound department in Hollywood, which meant the best in the world. He was Norma Shearer’s brother and Irving Thalberg’s brother in law.

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I think 20th Century Fox ran a very close second. And with 4 track magnetic sound on CinemaScope Fox was the first studio to bring stereo to the regular market, Cinerama being only in large cities. Although as it happened most CinemaScope theaters used the mono optical track, the conversion to the new screen being expense enough for many theater owners.
 
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JBL enclosures of the 50 and 60's were, in my humble opinion, some of the most elegant designs I have seen.

The size of an enclosure is a by-product of the design, and not necessarily the driving force.

I have a pair of A-7's which I think are pretty awesome, but they ain't going in my living room.
The solution is to mount the Altec drivers in the walls and set the jbls in the corners then tell everybody the awesome sound is coming from the pretty little speakers. :D
 
Just wanted to post this link. I am new to this information but it really goes way back.
The LH site is an old companion for many of us enthusiasts.

If you really want to get under the hood of the beast, it's not as easy as it used to be. But, patent searches are still your best friend.

Another good resource specifically on the Lansing topic is John Eargle's book "The JBL Story".

51sYmCXVRzL._SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_.jpg
 
The LH site is an old companion for many of us enthusiasts.

If you really want to get under the hood of the beast, it's not as easy as it used to be. But, patent searches are still your best friend.

Another good resource specifically on the Lansing topic is John Eargle's book "The JBL Story".

51sYmCXVRzL._SX218_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_.jpg
Knowing what I know now, I wish I had corresponded with JE about Jim Lansing's time in SLC Utah.
 
Martini and Decker moved to Los Angeles where they set up a business manufacturing loudspeakers. It was called the Lansing Manufacturing Company. Just before the company was registered on March 9, 1927, Lansing changed his name from James Martini to James Bullough Lansing at the suggestion of his future wife, Glenna.

I've googled it, but have never understood why he changed his name to Lansing. Was it an effort to avoid having a more ethnic-sounding name?

And did it have anything to do with the city in Michigan?
 
Thank you for a terrific overview! It begs more questions
- what did the company and more importantly, the principle players do during the war (1941-45)?
- So they built some great furniture, do we know how they sounded?

I'll google my own questions later, it's probably known on the web already!
 
Possibly. Or to have a last name that matched the name of the company he co-founded.


Don't know, good question.
The bio at the Lansing Heritage website is frustratingly unclear about that, or what the brand name the the Salt Lake City products carried. I do not recall ever seeing Salt Lake made Lansing anything there where I was raised, and I would have noticed. I am still trying to find info on his association with Nathaniel Baldwin during the Salt Lake City years, but perhaps should also namecheck "Martini" as well as Lansing.
Btw, the article perpetuates the myth that Nathaniel Baldwin "invented headphones", which I can say with certainty that he most certainly did not, he did develop and manufacture an improved headset particularly suited to early radio requirements. I know because I tracked down the source of the myth and talked to him face to face.
 
Recently found this:
https://everything2.com/title/James+B.+Lansing

Some of the info on the Salt Lake period, including the info on Baldwin and loudspeakers and the development of Jim's own speakers is factually foggy, afaik. Baldwin's involvement as a major mfgr was limited to his famous popular type 'C' headphones, not so much speakers tho he made horn types based on the headphone element, for which it turned out not to be particularly suited due to armature pivot wires fracturing under heavy drive. The introduction of the revolutionary GE Radiola 104 electrodynamic baffle cabinet loudspeaker in the mid-1920s eventually obsolesced other types for home use by 1930. Meanwhile, whatever Jim was doing in SLC at the time was probably magnetic armature pattern as was most everyone else, used mainly with the "coffin" table radios of the period. I wish I knew more for sure, but as I posted earlier, solid info on this period for James Martini-Lansing is thin at best.
 
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