[Bill Noble[_2_]]

"Alan Hoyle" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 27 Nov 2008 04:38:11, Alan Hoyle wrote:
I was listening to the Business Today on the BBC World Service last
night and they had a short piece on the invention of headphones. They
interviewed John Koss as part of the story, played some of his music
in the background, and gave some of the historical perspective. All
in all, it was an interesting piece, but I haven't seen it on the
World Service web page yet.

-alan

Still nothing on the web site, but there was a particular anecdote
that was worth sharing. In the interview with Mr. Koss, he mentioned
how he got headphone jacks added to amplifiers. The story
(paraphrased) was as follows:

Two primary amplifier manufacturers were around at the time (let's
call them "A" and "B" since I can't recall the details) and they were
heavily in competition. Mr. Koss had been in discussions with both of
them trying to get them to install jacks on their amps, but neither of
them were willing to do so.

While talking to "A," Koss said something to the effect of "Well, B is
going to add them." and A's response was "Wait, wait wait... If
they're doing that, then we're going to too." Koss then went to "B"
and did roughly the same thing. Thus both manufacturers were
convinced to put headphone jacks on their pieces.

-a

--
Alan Hoyle - - http://www.alanhoyle.com/

Interesting anecdote, but, just for your information, I have in my garage a
radio called a Gilfillan Neutrodyne, made in 1924, it has 01A tubes in it, a
wooden case, and multiple headphone jacks, one at the detector and one after
the AF amplifier. Also interesting (to me) is that the volume control
adjusts a resistor in series with the filament of the audio amplifier.

So, I would say that there is no question that audio equipment had headphone
jacks long before 1950. these were, of course, not stereo

[Sonnova]

On Tue, 2 Dec 2008 05:35:14 -0800, Bill Noble wrote
(in article ):

"Alan Hoyle" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 27 Nov 2008 04:38:11, Alan Hoyle wrote:
I was listening to the Business Today on the BBC World Service last
night and they had a short piece on the invention of headphones. They
interviewed John Koss as part of the story, played some of his music
in the background, and gave some of the historical perspective. All
in all, it was an interesting piece, but I haven't seen it on the
World Service web page yet.

-alan

Still nothing on the web site, but there was a particular anecdote
that was worth sharing. In the interview with Mr. Koss, he mentioned
how he got headphone jacks added to amplifiers. The story
(paraphrased) was as follows:

Two primary amplifier manufacturers were around at the time (let's
call them "A" and "B" since I can't recall the details) and they were
heavily in competition. Mr. Koss had been in discussions with both of
them trying to get them to install jacks on their amps, but neither of
them were willing to do so.

While talking to "A," Koss said something to the effect of "Well, B is
going to add them." and A's response was "Wait, wait wait... If
they're doing that, then we're going to too." Koss then went to "B"
and did roughly the same thing. Thus both manufacturers were
convinced to put headphone jacks on their pieces.

-a

--
Alan Hoyle - - http://www.alanhoyle.com/

Interesting anecdote, but, just for your information, I have in my garage a
radio called a Gilfillan Neutrodyne, made in 1924, it has 01A tubes in it, a
wooden case, and multiple headphone jacks, one at the detector and one after
the AF amplifier. Also interesting (to me) is that the volume control
adjusts a resistor in series with the filament of the audio amplifier.

So, I would say that there is no question that audio equipment had headphone
jacks long before 1950. these were, of course, not stereo


EVERYBODY listened to headphones in 1924 because the dynamic loudspeaker was
in its infancy and headphones were, basically, the only game in town. That
had changed by 1927 though. You won't find headphone jacks on radios that
came with loudspeakers after about 1930, of if you did, they were rare.