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Vintage Innovators—a List

Susurus

Susurus

Resolution:6.62×10^-34
Who are the legends?
Who done it?

Who were the inspiration behind our brushed aluminum faceplates--
and who designed the badassest, most bodacious speakers?

The (nearly) unique -- like the Marantz 19 'scope' -- the exotic -- the beautiful (B & O uprights) -- the sleepers -- (Penny's MCS 3125)

Please add to this list—
and thanks AKers worldwide.
:thmbsp:

—Susurus

______

Legend /
___Brands /
______Noteworthy accomplishments /
__________Whimsical anecdotes /
Where are they now?

_______________________

1875 Nikita Tesla / Westinghouse /inventer of radio*, practical power generation and transmission / AC vs DC battle with Edison, who once electrocuted an elephant to 'proove' AC was unsafe! / OCD like 'Monk' in some ways [soundweasel]

1887 Torakusu Yamaha / Pianos and Motorcycles and the CR-2040 mmm.../
1968 - Yamaha produces its first line of hi-fi stereo equipment.
1971 - Yamaha begins semiconductor production. Yamaha's history
[wajobu]

1925 Peter Bang & Svend Olufsen B&O / AC radio / Jacob Jensen’s designs never looked like anybody else’s /

1932 Gilbert Briggs / Wharfedale / 2-way; ceramic magnet/Carnegie Hall demo, Sand filled sound insulator

1933 Vebjørn Tandberg / Tandberg 3001A /nicer reel-to-reels /


klipsch_paul.jpg
1946 Paul Wilbur Klipsch / Khorns; horn-loaded hi-fi / wore 4 watches and sported buttons saying “Bu11sh1t” / -2002 age 98, Hope AR. Biography: ‘Paul Wilbur Klipsch the Life... the Legend’ more..

1946 / Onkyo /non pressed cone, plastic cone titanium diaphragm

1947 Khosaku Kikuchi / Sansui /feed-forward servo / The name means “Mountain and Water” / /

1952 Edgar Villchur & Henry Kloss /Acoustic Research /acoustic suspension, domes / there's an AR3 on display at the Smithsonian.

1952 Saul B. Marantz / 10b tuner, many superb receivers/ unique oscilloscope tuning ~1978 [* SAE also had a 'scope tuner]

1957 Henry Kloss / AR, KLH- (Kloss, Malcolm S. Low, and J. Anton Hoffman), Advent / yep he gets mentioned twice... / / [grateful]

1949 Frank McIntosh / McIntosh Laboratories is noted for its extremely high build quality and excellent technical specifications. The "classic" vacuum tube components of the 1960s include the MC275 power amplifier, the C22 preamplifier, and the MR67 tuner. Later McIntosh solid-state power amps are known for their distinctive blue colored meters.
[At one point they had a lifetime warranty, and they are still in business making great gear! ]
__________________
[PM Summer]


dK7kCWh7z9sM.jpg
1965 Ray Dolby / Dolby noise reduction systems / The 1971 film A Clockwork Orange was the first film with the Dolby encoded soundtrack [grateful]
more

1970 Winslow Burhoe (formerly with AR and KLH) formed his own company, Epicure Products, Inc., manufacturing EPI and Epicure speakers.

EPI speakers were based on a module that Burhoe designed using an eight-inch woofer and an inverted dome tweeter (I've seen this listed as being both ¾ inch and one inch, though I am positive it was then billed as a ¾ inch unit). The woofer was unique in that it needed no crossover, as it naturally and smoothly rolled off at higher frequencies.

[* Again that word unique--my 1968 Scott S-11D 3-way speakers also take advantage of the natural roll-off in this manner.]
__________________
[PM Summer]

1972 Bob Carver / Phase Linear 700, Amazing / Famous Challenge – replicate any amp any price, he won / / /

1972 Etsuro Nakamichi / Nakamichi / Dragon--three-head cassette deck/

Lincoln Walsh / Walsh – Ohm / downward transmission line / [*omnidirectional single-driver full-range]

1970s Richard Schram / Concept 16.5 / “the best damn receiver anybody ever saw” / 1981- president of Parasound
[* there's one remaining contemporary competitor I have not yet compared my 16.5 with: Marantz 2385.]

1974 John Curl / Mark Levinson JC-2 preamp //1989- Parasound's analog design consultant

Polk / /

1979 / / Boston Acoustics / / /

Ken Kreisel, Jonas Miller, and Dr. Lester Field/ M&K / HT, Powered Subwoofers / / just gone bust

[I've since learned that the sub/satellites configuration dates back at least to Klipsch in 1959]

/ Magneplanar[/B]/ dipolar planar system/ ,

[ since this first post I've learned about different dispersion patter strategies: nearfield, cylindrical, figure-8, Quad time-managed point source, coaxial, circumaxial...and limited, infinite, staggerred, and no baffle edge-reflection ideas... ]

/ Pioneer-Technics /

/ Kenwood / /

1980 / MCS 3125 – by Itoh / /



Ray Dolby, The Shure brothers, David Hafler [grateful]

Dave Newman--melonhead audio. [WhiteSE]

Jack Sujovolsky - Owner - Audio Pawnography[dnewma04]

Roy Allison -- Allison Acoustics [soundweasel]


--Dates refer to company foundings, significant invention, conceptual breakthrough, or innovative audio idea realized/propagated, or just a guess...

---
Now Playing: Concept 16.5, Klipsch RF-7s
Sony MDR-600 headphones

Just scored: Parasound HCA-750A (nudie pics soon :yes:)

HT: M&K S-1Bs
Klipsch RF-3s
& RP-3s for powered subs

Restoring: Sansui 4000


Reminisce: Genesis, Sennheisers :music:
Concept 6.5 & 3.5, Calibre 215,
OHM FRS-7s, OHM Cam-16s

[*wait another year, expect more refined/intelligeble opinions as my knowledge base grows... ]
 
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Founded in 1949 by Frank McIntosh, McIntosh Laboratories is noted for its extremely high build quality and excellent technical specifications. The "classic" vacuum tube components of the 1960s include the MC275 power amplifier, the C22 preamplifier, and the MR67 tuner. Later McIntosh solid-state power amps are known for their distinctive blue colored meters.
 
1970 Winslow Burhoe (formerly with AR and KLH) formed his own company, Epicure Products, Inc., manufacturing EPI and Epicure speakers.

EPI speakers were based on a module that Burhoe designed using an eight-inch woofer and an inverted dome tweeter (I've seen this listed as being both ¾ inch and one inch, though I am positive it was then billed as a ¾ inch unit). The woofer was unique in that it needed no crossover, as it naturally and smoothly rolled off at higher frequencies.
 
Roy Allison -- Allison Acoustics

Note on Nikola Tesla -- he is now also recognized as the true inventor of radio which had been erroneously attributed to Marconi.

From wikipedia:
Although radio invention was long attributed to Guglielmo Marconi, today we recognize that the inventor of the radio is Serbian-American genius Nikola Tesla. However, the identity of the original inventor of radio, at the time called wireless telegraphy, is contentious. Development from a laboratory demonstration to commercial utility spanned several decades and required the efforts of many practitioners.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Tesla_patents
 
PM Summer, this is exactly the form of info I'm interested in. Kudos!

Wasn't aware McIntosh ventured into the solid state realm. My 'dome' must be inverted :lol:
 
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grateful, aww, not 'Harvey', James Stewart's invisible rabbit friend? :drunk:

—Susurus
 
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WhilteSE, dnewma04, names a totally new to me. Anything more?

soundweasel, Roy Allison -- another one I'm not familiar with. Cool, it's a cornucopia; always something new in Vintage Audio...

And I did read a book on Tesla (the inventor not the group). If he'd pressed Westinghouse for the royalties he legally held on generated power from Niagra Falls, he'd have been the richest man in history.

—Susurus
 
Armstrong - anyone not knowing of him surrender your membership

E.H. Scott - Forefather of hi-end audio

Peter Walker and Art Janszen: between the pair of them they developed and brought to market practical electrostatic speakers. Also, Art developed the bi-wire crossover but never gave it a thought as to a patent. A major mistake on his part for it would have been his ticket to easy street.

Sid Harmon is credited with the development of the receiver as we now know it.

Koss developed the stereophone and made headphones part of respectable audio.

I'd not include either Frank McIntosh nor Saul Marantz unless you want to credit Frank for the unitary transformer and Saul for putting an o'scope in a tuner and for my his 1 bug contribution which was proving a straight line tone arm was technically possible. Frank and Saul made marvelous equipment but neither really revolutionized life.

Avery Fisher for the 1st transistor amp.

Dick Sequerra for developing the Marantz 10.

Richard Modafari (sp) for the RIMO filter moving the engineering world beyond the butterworth filter.

Joe Grado

William Johnson for pulling us back from tube audio extinction.

Sid Olson - developer of the strain relief cartridge

Villcher for the AS speaker; not Kloss

Kloss for developing the projector television; this was truly his legecy and not his speakers.

Rudy Bozak for his work in developing metal cone drivers and the active bi-amp system. Something he was not credited for.
 
Robert Grodinsky - From AR and possibly the designer of the LST if an article I read as true. Better known for patents in noise reduction technology in the pro audio field.
 
Wintec had the first TV tuner in a receiver. It was audio only but still the first attempt I have seen at building an AV receiver.
 
Regarding my previous post Ray Dolby developed Dolby noise reduction; this made the high fidelity cassette deck possible. Henry Kloss should also be credited here with the development of the first really high fidelity cassette deck the Advent model 201. This deck also introduced cro2 tape with proper bias and record/play equalization and of course Dolby noise reduction. The transport had much lower wow and flutter than any of the competition. (About 1970)
David Hafler founded Dynaco first affordable really high quality stereo amplifier, (ST70) first affordable excellent preamp (PAS) first affordable great mpx tuner (FM3). Offering these units in kit form made getting a great Hifi system affordable. (about 1955) Equipment was almost as good as McIntosh for 1/4 the price.

Shure brothers first excellent affordable stereo magnetic cartridge (M3D) (about 1958)
 
A sad tale

Major Edwin Armstrong designer/inventor or FM Radio, who took his concept to David Sarnof of RCA. RCA bought into the patents and promply made every effort to protect their existing AM radio empire, killed all attempts to establish FM radio. They went so far as to convince the FCC to change all the FM frequencies and obsolete existing FM radios.
Exhaused and frustrated Armstrong jumped to his death from a 13th floor in 1954.
 
wajobu said:
Excellent start...let's see what I can dig-up.
...
Welcome to AK Susurus!
Click to expand...

Thanks! And I was concerned my first post would get ignored and shelved...:thmbsp: :thmbsp:

P.S. How you compacted all that Blue and Silver gear into your 150 char Signature limitation, I'll never know!
 
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