WEBVTT - The Rise and Fall of Magnavox 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:14.600 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:14.720 --> 0:00:18.120 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 0:00:18.160 --> 0:00:20.840 and a love of all things tech. And in our 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:24.880 last episode, we looked at how co founders Edwin Priddham 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:29.479 and Peter Jensen, not only kept their young company alive 0:00:29.840 --> 0:00:33.360 by creating a moving coil loudspeaker, but they also came 0:00:33.440 --> 0:00:36.320 up with the name of the company and is Magnavox, 0:00:36.840 --> 0:00:40.520 after first calling the loudspeaker that name, so originally Magnavox 0:00:40.640 --> 0:00:44.559 was the name for a type of technology, a loud speaker. 0:00:44.960 --> 0:00:48.000 We also learned about how the two engineers created noise 0:00:48.040 --> 0:00:51.360 canceling microphones for use in aircraft during World War One, 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:54.080 as well as how the company tried to get into 0:00:54.120 --> 0:00:58.200 the consumer electronics business and the young business of radio 0:00:58.680 --> 0:01:01.240 once the war was over. We also learned that in 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:04.920 nineteen twenty five, after having disagreements with leadership, Peter Jensen, 0:01:04.959 --> 0:01:07.360 one of the co founders, left the company and he 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:10.040 would go on to found his own companies and later 0:01:10.080 --> 0:01:13.480 on pass away in nineteen sixty one. But back to 0:01:13.560 --> 0:01:17.920 Magnavox and the mid to late nineteen twenties, the company 0:01:17.959 --> 0:01:22.240 was actually too pretty unsteady ground in nive. It wasn't 0:01:22.280 --> 0:01:26.720 just because Jensen had left. Magnavox had overestimated the demand 0:01:26.959 --> 0:01:32.200 for radio sets in the early days and had overproduced radios, 0:01:32.280 --> 0:01:36.000 so it expanded operations. It had opened up a warehouse 0:01:36.040 --> 0:01:38.840 and distribution center in New York, But by the end 0:01:38.840 --> 0:01:42.800 of nineteen twenty five, with the costs of operation so 0:01:42.920 --> 0:01:46.880 high in the radio business so cut throat, Magnavox chose 0:01:47.040 --> 0:01:50.520 to close those New York offices because those offices weren't 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:52.840 really serving a purpose. Because the company was finding it 0:01:53.000 --> 0:01:55.960 hard to sell consumer radios. There's just too many on 0:01:56.000 --> 0:01:58.680 the market and there wasn't enough you know, demand there yet, 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:01.920 and the business owns began to consider alternatives to having 0:02:01.960 --> 0:02:04.840 a base of operations in California as well. There was 0:02:04.880 --> 0:02:07.440 no denying that California was a huge market, a lot 0:02:07.440 --> 0:02:10.960 of people live there, but shipping components like copper wire, 0:02:11.880 --> 0:02:15.480 which largely came out of the Midwestern states in America, 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:18.959 and and shipping them all the way across the states 0:02:19.000 --> 0:02:22.760 to California and or the manufacture stuff that was really expensive. 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:25.400 Now the company also hit a stumbling block when it 0:02:25.440 --> 0:02:29.120 started to produce its own vacuum tubes. The company was 0:02:29.160 --> 0:02:32.560 trying to get off the dependence of other manufacturing companies 0:02:32.560 --> 0:02:36.000 and to become more self sufficient and thus produce all 0:02:36.040 --> 0:02:38.600 the different components that would go into things like a radio. 0:02:39.040 --> 0:02:43.160 The earliest Magnavox tubes had a tendency to short out, 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:45.120 which is not good. Like some of them wouldn't even 0:02:45.200 --> 0:02:49.520 last longer than a few hours of operation. Later tubes 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:53.279 continued to have some reliability issues, and this gave Magnavox 0:02:53.360 --> 0:02:58.040 a bad reputation among distributors and independent radio manufacturers. They 0:02:58.080 --> 0:03:00.320 realized that if they built their radios and they used 0:03:00.360 --> 0:03:05.880 Magnavox tubes as amplifiers, that they would frequently stop functioning 0:03:06.240 --> 0:03:08.600 not long after they were first print in use. That's 0:03:08.639 --> 0:03:11.640 not that's not good. And this was bad enough that 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:15.640 by mid ninety seven, the board of directors from Magnavox 0:03:15.800 --> 0:03:19.799 ordered the two production facilities to shut down. They also 0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:23.520 shut down consumer radio production, so for the next decade 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:26.920 or so, Magnavox didn't make consumer radios. Instead, it would 0:03:26.919 --> 0:03:31.359 make components for independent radio companies, and they just sold 0:03:31.400 --> 0:03:35.160 those directly to manufacturers. Now, the reason for that shutdown 0:03:35.760 --> 0:03:39.240 was that Magnavox still had more radios produced than it 0:03:39.320 --> 0:03:42.240 could sell. They were literally taking up space and warehouses 0:03:42.600 --> 0:03:46.240 in the company had built radio sets that had five 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:49.880 tubes in them for the purposes of tuning, you know, 0:03:49.920 --> 0:03:54.120 receiving tuning and amplifying signals. And despite the fact that 0:03:54.200 --> 0:03:58.080 analysts had predicted that people would want six tube radio 0:03:58.160 --> 0:04:03.680 sets that had gray or functionality by nine, Magnifux said, 0:04:04.040 --> 0:04:06.560 we're going to stick with the five tube design. The 0:04:06.640 --> 0:04:10.080 reason they did that was that they were worried that 0:04:10.120 --> 0:04:12.560 if they moved to a six tube design for the 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:15.640 new models, no one would ever buy the old sets 0:04:15.640 --> 0:04:19.800 that were sitting around in warehouses, and so you know, 0:04:19.880 --> 0:04:23.320 Magnifux would be stuck with all these obsolete radios. But 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:27.279 then no one bought the new five tube sets that 0:04:27.320 --> 0:04:29.960 Magnavox produced, so it was an even bigger loss. Right, 0:04:30.000 --> 0:04:33.599 Instead of a warehouse filled with old five tube sets 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:37.440 while the six tube sets were selling, there were warehouses 0:04:37.560 --> 0:04:41.400 full full filled with even more five tube sets. And 0:04:41.480 --> 0:04:45.800 all told, Magnifox lost around a million dollars due to 0:04:45.839 --> 0:04:50.280 the issues with tube reliability and performance of their radio sales. UH. 0:04:50.320 --> 0:04:53.760 And remember we're talking about the nineteen twenties here. A 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:56.159 million dollars is a lot of money, don't get me wrong, 0:04:56.279 --> 0:04:59.520 but when you factor in inflation, it's an astronomical amount 0:04:59.520 --> 0:05:03.159 of money. Uh So, not only wasn't an expensive blow, 0:05:03.279 --> 0:05:06.120 but also tarnished Magnavox's reputation, so it would make it 0:05:06.200 --> 0:05:10.440 harder for Magnuvox to win back the confidence of distributors 0:05:10.480 --> 0:05:14.400 and manufacturers in the future. Magnavox also tried to branch 0:05:14.440 --> 0:05:18.480 out and diversify beyond loudspeakers and radios. In nineteen twenty 0:05:18.520 --> 0:05:22.080 four of the company introduced an electric heater. Electric heaters 0:05:22.080 --> 0:05:24.720 work on a pretty simple principle, which is that of 0:05:24.839 --> 0:05:30.280 electrical resistance. So every conductor, every material that is electrically 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:35.280 conductive under normal conditions, has some amount of electrical resistance, 0:05:35.520 --> 0:05:39.400 and that's kind of like friction in the world of electricity. 0:05:39.640 --> 0:05:43.080 Electrical resistance depends on a few factors, first and foremost 0:05:43.600 --> 0:05:47.159 the material itself. So, for example, copper is a really 0:05:47.200 --> 0:05:51.040 good electrical conductor, and as a fairly low resistance, silver 0:05:51.560 --> 0:05:55.200 is an even better electrical conductor. In fact, silver would 0:05:55.200 --> 0:05:57.240 be a great conductor if it weren't for the fact 0:05:57.240 --> 0:06:00.520 that one it's pretty scarce and to will think it's 0:06:00.520 --> 0:06:03.480 pretty so they want to turn it into jewelry and stuff. 0:06:04.000 --> 0:06:07.760 But you know, the material is not just the only 0:06:07.839 --> 0:06:12.680 factor that you know ends up affecting resistance. The gauge 0:06:12.800 --> 0:06:16.720 or thickness of a wire also matters. Thin wires, which 0:06:18.160 --> 0:06:22.240 somewhat paradoxically on on casual glance, have a higher gauge, 0:06:22.760 --> 0:06:27.479 they have greater electrical resistance than thicker wires or wires 0:06:27.520 --> 0:06:31.159 that have a low gauge. And again that might seem 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:34.920 counterintuitive in the gauge factor, right, like a sixteen gauge 0:06:34.920 --> 0:06:38.599 wire is actually thinner than a twelve gauge wire. Anyway, 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:42.360 the thicker the wire or cable, the lower the electrical resistance. 0:06:42.760 --> 0:06:45.960 Other things, by the way, can also change electrical resistance. 0:06:46.120 --> 0:06:49.440 For example, if you were too super cool a good 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:52.359 conductor like copper. In other words, if you were to 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:56.560 reduce the temperature of the copper too close to absolute zero, 0:06:57.000 --> 0:07:01.560 you can reduce or even eliminate electrical resistance entirely. This 0:07:01.640 --> 0:07:05.200 is what facilities like the large hadron collider do. It's 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:07.279 kind of like a playground slide if you want to 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:08.840 think of it. That way, So the surface of a 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:13.000 slide resists stuff sliding down it to some degree, right, 0:07:13.120 --> 0:07:15.000 Like you might slide a slide and you go like 0:07:15.240 --> 0:07:17.400 it's kind of stop and start. On a hot day, 0:07:17.440 --> 0:07:20.000 you might just stick to it um so you can 0:07:20.040 --> 0:07:22.320 slide down, but you feel the friction between you and 0:07:22.360 --> 0:07:24.280 the slide. But let's say you were to coat that 0:07:24.320 --> 0:07:28.640 slide in I don't know, baby oil, you would drastically 0:07:28.680 --> 0:07:32.040 reduce the friction and kids on that playground would just 0:07:32.120 --> 0:07:34.480 zoom right off that slide. By the way, don't do that, 0:07:34.880 --> 0:07:38.600 you'll hurt people. Don't hurt people. But anyway, even with 0:07:38.640 --> 0:07:40.800 the baby oil, you'd still have some friction, but it 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:43.400 would be much much less than normal, and you would 0:07:43.440 --> 0:07:46.560 slide much faster. Kind Of similar when we're talking about 0:07:46.920 --> 0:07:50.040 electrical resistance. But let's get back to electric heaters, all right. 0:07:50.120 --> 0:07:54.480 So electric current runs through a conductive material, which again 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:58.200 has some amount of electrical resistance. Well, that resistance means 0:07:58.240 --> 0:08:02.080 that some of that electrical energy converts into heat. Now, 0:08:02.120 --> 0:08:06.320 typically we think of this as waste. The electronics heat 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:09.320 up and the heat gets released into the environment, and 0:08:09.400 --> 0:08:13.480 we don't typically do anything with that extra heat. In fact, 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:16.640 electronics like computers and such typically have fans in them 0:08:16.680 --> 0:08:20.040 to help disperse the heat that's generated through electrical resistance, 0:08:20.400 --> 0:08:26.120 because if electrical components overheat, they typically fail. An electric heater, however, 0:08:26.280 --> 0:08:30.440 makes heat through electrical resistance on purpose. The electric circuits 0:08:30.520 --> 0:08:33.920 in electric heater have resistors built into them specifically so 0:08:33.960 --> 0:08:36.959 that they heat up and convert more of the electric 0:08:37.000 --> 0:08:40.880 current into heat. The resistors are made of materials that 0:08:40.880 --> 0:08:43.439 can with stand high temperatures for a long time, so 0:08:43.920 --> 0:08:48.079 they don't break down due to this heating process. The 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:50.640 same is true for the elements that are in an 0:08:50.679 --> 0:08:54.640 electric toaster or in an electric oven, and that's how 0:08:54.640 --> 0:08:57.440 electric heaters work in a nutshell, all right. Back to 0:08:57.520 --> 0:08:59.800 some of the other products that Magnavox was making around 0:08:59.840 --> 0:09:03.360 this time. There was also an on demand water heater, 0:09:03.800 --> 0:09:07.080 which you would mount directly onto a faucet, heating the 0:09:07.120 --> 0:09:09.280 water just before it came out of the pipes and 0:09:09.360 --> 0:09:11.839 through the faucet itself. This, by the way, it works 0:09:11.840 --> 0:09:14.160 in a very similar way to an electric heater. You 0:09:14.200 --> 0:09:18.360 have pipes that are surrounded by electric or sometimes gas 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:22.240 powered heating elements, and so when you want hot water, 0:09:22.440 --> 0:09:25.800 these elements turn on and they get really hot, and 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.800 the water passing through the pipes picks up some of 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:31.840 that thermal energy and heats up, so that eventually the 0:09:31.840 --> 0:09:35.480 water comes out hot. The company also created a laying 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:40.720 cage for chickens and apparently also created an automatic egg cooker. 0:09:41.240 --> 0:09:44.400 These designs never really went into full production, so they 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:46.600 were in very limited runs as far as I can tell, 0:09:46.600 --> 0:09:49.559 and I wasn't able to find much information on them 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:53.080 before I went to record this episode. So I wish 0:09:53.120 --> 0:09:55.280 I could tell you more about an automatic egg cooker 0:09:55.320 --> 0:09:58.120 from Magnifux, but I don't have that info. One item 0:09:58.200 --> 0:10:01.000 that did come out that was success full was the 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:04.640 Magna Lux adjustable lamp, which was a death lamp that 0:10:04.760 --> 0:10:07.480 was on an articulated arm, and it looks a lot 0:10:07.559 --> 0:10:09.560 like common desk lamps of today, you know, like the 0:10:09.640 --> 0:10:13.160 lamps that have the hinged arm in them so that 0:10:13.200 --> 0:10:15.920 you can position them in different ways. Magnavox made one 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:18.560 of those that was pretty successful, but the bread and 0:10:18.600 --> 0:10:22.880 Butter from Magnavox remained. The loud speaker. The company continued 0:10:22.920 --> 0:10:26.800 to sell cone based loud speakers. This was the backbone 0:10:26.840 --> 0:10:31.079 of their business. Speakers were what the company really uh 0:10:31.520 --> 0:10:35.839 you know, made their name on literally and still were 0:10:36.040 --> 0:10:39.679 the most important product they were creating. They weren't generally 0:10:39.720 --> 0:10:42.679 meant for the average consumer. They weren't selling these two 0:10:42.920 --> 0:10:48.080 customers directly. They were selling them to other companies like 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:53.200 They became the component of choice for several independent radio 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:57.480 manufacturing companies. So you might buy a radio set that 0:10:57.520 --> 0:11:00.240 has a different brand on it, but it had Magnavox 0:11:00.360 --> 0:11:03.320 speakers in it. They did, however, try to create a 0:11:03.360 --> 0:11:07.000 retail market for consumer speakers. By the time of nineteen 0:11:07.040 --> 0:11:10.040 twenty nine to nineteen thirty, the leaders of Magnifux realized 0:11:10.080 --> 0:11:13.439 that they needed to change operations. Their main customers were 0:11:13.440 --> 0:11:18.000 now independent radio manufacturers who were purchasing Magnafux speakers to 0:11:18.040 --> 0:11:20.439 go into their radio sets, and they were mostly located 0:11:20.600 --> 0:11:23.800 in the Midwest of the United States. And as I 0:11:23.840 --> 0:11:27.959 mentioned earlier, copper cable also primarily was coming out of 0:11:28.000 --> 0:11:31.200 the Midwest. So in nineteen twenty nine, Magnavox opened up 0:11:31.240 --> 0:11:34.640 an assembly plant in Chicago, Illinois, with the goal of 0:11:34.880 --> 0:11:39.000 shifting operations to the Midwest. Then the stock market crashed. 0:11:39.679 --> 0:11:43.040 Now this had a massive effect across nearly every industry, 0:11:43.400 --> 0:11:45.240 not just in the United States, but in the world, 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:48.960 Magnavox was forced to go through a company reorganization to 0:11:49.000 --> 0:11:52.240 stay afloat the leaders decided to shut down the California 0:11:52.280 --> 0:11:56.320 operations and they moved everything to Chicago. Forty five employees 0:11:56.320 --> 0:11:59.360 would actually make that move, although almost all of them 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:01.720 would end up leaving the company over the following couple 0:12:01.760 --> 0:12:04.440 of years and Magnafux would end up hiring all new 0:12:04.480 --> 0:12:09.480 people to work the company. Magnafux would relocate again, however, 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:13.040 not long after relocating to Chicago. This time they moved 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:16.240 to Fort Wayne, Indiana. That's where the company set up 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:19.880 a new manufacturing facility, and it wouldn't produce consumer products 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:22.640 for several more years. Instead, it focused on tech that 0:12:22.640 --> 0:12:25.880 would go into products coming out of other manufacturers. In 0:12:26.120 --> 0:12:32.079 nine Magnavox founded the Magnavux Company Limited. You might wonder 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:34.600 why it did that. This has to do with the 0:12:34.640 --> 0:12:38.000 fact that the earlier incorporation of Magnavox was out of 0:12:38.040 --> 0:12:41.760 the state of Arizona. So even though the company headquarters 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:46.560 were located in California, the leaders chose to incorporate in Arizona. Well. 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:49.640 The business leaders now wanted to switch this to Delaware, 0:12:50.120 --> 0:12:52.640 and you might wonder why that's so. I mean, if 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:54.280 you were to just look at a list of Fortune 0:12:54.840 --> 0:12:56.679 companies in the United States, you would see that more 0:12:56.720 --> 0:13:00.800 than half of them are incorporated in Delaware. Delaware is 0:13:00.840 --> 0:13:03.440 not a big state and it has less than a 0:13:03.520 --> 0:13:05.720 million people living in it, so you might wonder what 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:08.840 the heck is going on here. Well, the big reason 0:13:09.640 --> 0:13:12.080 is that Delaware leads the US when it comes to 0:13:12.200 --> 0:13:16.520 laws that define what corporations can and cannot do. Plus, 0:13:17.160 --> 0:13:20.719 Delaware has a special court called the Court of Chancery 0:13:20.760 --> 0:13:25.400 that only focuses on cases involving corporate law. So cases 0:13:25.520 --> 0:13:28.400 appear before a judge. There's no jury trial, it's just 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:31.640 a judge, and they get fast tracked into that system. 0:13:31.760 --> 0:13:35.800 So that means there's fewer delays compared to other court systems. 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:37.559 If you were in a different state and you had 0:13:37.600 --> 0:13:40.400 to bring a matter to court, you would be put 0:13:40.440 --> 0:13:43.240 on a waiting list along with every other case that 0:13:43.320 --> 0:13:45.960 was being tried by those courts. But because Delaware has 0:13:46.000 --> 0:13:50.760 the specific court for corporate law matters, things are much faster. 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:55.239 So being incorporated in Delaware, even if the company's headquarters 0:13:55.240 --> 0:13:59.160 are in some other state, has legal advantages. Anyway, the 0:13:59.200 --> 0:14:02.440 Magnafucx Come and He Limited became a holding company. It 0:14:02.520 --> 0:14:06.160 purchased all the stock from the Magnavox Company that was 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:12.000 incorporated in Arizona, so effectively it shifted the incorporation to Delaware. 0:14:12.600 --> 0:14:15.160 So this was an example of jumping through some legal 0:14:15.200 --> 0:14:18.800 hoops to change the incorporation status of the company. Uh, 0:14:19.080 --> 0:14:23.440 Magnavox Company Limited didn't really do anything. It was just 0:14:23.520 --> 0:14:27.480 a holding company for the Magna Magnafux Company Incorporated, that 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:30.480 was the company that was actually doing the manufacturing. Around 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:34.280 this time, Magnavox also acquired part of the AMRAD Corporation. 0:14:35.120 --> 0:14:39.320 AMRAD stands for Amateur Radio Research and Development. It previously 0:14:39.400 --> 0:14:43.680 merged with the Crosley Radio Corporation, which is a fastening 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:47.720 company in its own right. Crosley Radio made home radio sets, 0:14:47.760 --> 0:14:51.160 including some budget models, but by the late nineteen twenties, 0:14:51.200 --> 0:14:54.160 the am RED division had very little to do, and 0:14:54.200 --> 0:14:57.040 this kind of gets back into that oversaturation problem in 0:14:57.120 --> 0:15:00.920 the radio industry. And after the stock work crashed, the 0:15:00.960 --> 0:15:05.080 am RED division effectively shut down. So Magnavox purchased part 0:15:05.160 --> 0:15:07.680 of the am RED division and brought it into the 0:15:07.720 --> 0:15:11.920 fold of Magnavox am Red mostly created components for radios, 0:15:11.960 --> 0:15:14.840 including tubes that would be used like gas tubes that 0:15:14.840 --> 0:15:19.080 would be used rectifiers in radio. So Magnavox supplement its 0:15:19.120 --> 0:15:24.440 own capabilities with this acquisition. In Magnavox purchased a stake 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.520 of ownership in a company called Electro Acoustics Products located 0:15:28.560 --> 0:15:31.640 out of New York. The company created stuff like the 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:36.240 Illustra vox, and you might wonder what the heck that was. Well, 0:15:36.320 --> 0:15:40.360 the Illustra vox was a combination phonograph that's the vox 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:45.880 or voice and film strip projector presumably the Illustra part. 0:15:46.320 --> 0:15:48.480 It looked a lot like a film projector that had 0:15:48.480 --> 0:15:51.480 a record turntable smacked on top of it, so you 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:54.200 would load a film into the projector, which would indicate 0:15:54.280 --> 0:15:56.600 where you were when you were to put the needle 0:15:56.640 --> 0:16:00.200 down on the accompanying phonograph that had the soundtrack for 0:16:00.240 --> 0:16:03.360 the film strip, and then you would play the audio 0:16:03.440 --> 0:16:06.640 back along with the projected film. Now, obviously getting it 0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:08.960 just right was kind of an art in itself, so 0:16:09.000 --> 0:16:11.400 that the sound and images would match up, and they 0:16:11.400 --> 0:16:13.520 were used for a lot of stuff like training films 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:16.920 and that kind of thing. The acquisition of this company 0:16:16.920 --> 0:16:19.520 would mean that Magnavox was poised to return to the 0:16:19.560 --> 0:16:25.840 consumer market. By nineteen thirty six, seven Electroacoustics Products would 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:30.720 initially be a subsidiary of Magnavox, and in nineteen thirty seven, 0:16:30.840 --> 0:16:36.960 Magnavox introduced a tabletop radio unit designated as high Fidelity. 0:16:37.320 --> 0:16:40.120 We'll talk about what that means after this quick break. 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:51.040 All right, it's time to talk high fidelity. And by 0:16:51.040 --> 0:16:54.440 that I don't mean the Nick Hornby novel or the 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:58.280 movie adaptation of that novel starring John Cusack, or the 0:16:58.320 --> 0:17:02.560 Broadway musical adaptation or the TV series adaptation. Now we're 0:17:02.600 --> 0:17:08.440 talking the concept of high fidelity. So usually, though not always, 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:12.160 when you record a sound, what you want the recorded 0:17:12.240 --> 0:17:15.399 version of the sound to sound like is to be 0:17:15.440 --> 0:17:18.679 as close to the original sound as you can possibly 0:17:18.800 --> 0:17:23.160 make it. You are recreating the original sound through playback, 0:17:23.560 --> 0:17:25.760 but there are a lot of things that can interfere 0:17:25.840 --> 0:17:29.000 with the reproduced sound and it can make it fall short. 0:17:29.359 --> 0:17:31.840 The recording itself could be faulty that would be a 0:17:31.880 --> 0:17:34.760 big problem, or there could be issues with the playback 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:38.399 devices wiring, or the speakers might not be capable of 0:17:38.400 --> 0:17:42.400 playing back the sound without introducing distortion. Now, the word 0:17:42.440 --> 0:17:48.000 fidelity describes how pure a reproduced sound is. That is, 0:17:48.080 --> 0:17:50.919 a high fidelity experience is one in which there is 0:17:51.000 --> 0:17:54.959 little or no distortion introduced into the experience of the sound, 0:17:55.400 --> 0:17:59.239 so that you get a more pure playback experience. If 0:17:59.280 --> 0:18:02.200 you listen to a cordings of old gramophone or phonograph 0:18:02.240 --> 0:18:07.640 playback devices, you've probably heard teny warbly sounds that are interesting, 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:11.080 but they're clearly you know, they're not the identical to 0:18:11.119 --> 0:18:15.119 the original performance. You know, it's you're getting some components 0:18:15.160 --> 0:18:19.200 in there that were not intended necessarily. By the late 0:18:19.280 --> 0:18:23.160 nineteen thirties, companies were refining the components and playback devices 0:18:23.200 --> 0:18:26.880 and recording devices, and they were ferreting out the things 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:30.760 that were introduced distortion. This led to the marketing concept 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:33.600 of high fidelity. And to be clear, it's not just 0:18:33.840 --> 0:18:37.480 a marketing concept, but high fidelity or hi fi became 0:18:37.480 --> 0:18:42.160 a way to say, this audio device makes sound real good. 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:47.720 In seven Magnifux filed to reorganize with the federal government 0:18:47.800 --> 0:18:51.879 under the Bankruptcy Act, and the reorganization allowed the Magnifux 0:18:52.000 --> 0:18:56.200 Company Incorporated, which remember that's the subsidiary of the man 0:18:56.560 --> 0:19:00.439 Magnafux Company Limited. Magnifus Company incorporates the company that actually 0:19:00.480 --> 0:19:05.080 makes stuff. Well, they were then able to absorb Electroacoustics 0:19:05.160 --> 0:19:09.880 Products Company and merge it directly with Magnavox Company Incorporated. 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:12.960 So what this means is the version of Magnavox what 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:17.359 actually made stuff, absorbed the subsidiary and gobbled it on up, 0:19:17.720 --> 0:19:21.920 while the holding company that doesn't make stuff remain the same. 0:19:22.800 --> 0:19:26.200 This was also when Frank Freeman would become a vice 0:19:26.200 --> 0:19:31.920 president of Magnavox. Now, Freeman had founded Electroacoustics Products years earlier. 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:35.680 He was the head of that company when Magnavox acquired 0:19:35.720 --> 0:19:39.000 it as a subsidiary. So he joined Magnavox in the 0:19:39.040 --> 0:19:42.480 process of the merger, and he would become a vice 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:45.120 president of Magnavox, and he'll be a very important part 0:19:45.119 --> 0:19:47.840 of our story a little bit later on too. Now, 0:19:47.840 --> 0:19:50.960 the corporate structure became a little bit simpler a few 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:55.040 years later, in nineteen forty two, that's when Magnavox Company Limited, 0:19:55.359 --> 0:19:59.080 that is the holding company what doesn't make anything, changed 0:19:59.119 --> 0:20:04.920 its name to the Magnavox Company. Meanwhile, the Magnavox Company Incorporated. 0:20:05.800 --> 0:20:09.399 As in the part of the company what made things dissolved, 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:12.960 So now there was just the Magnavox Company. It was 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:15.280 no longer a holding company. Now that was everything. It 0:20:15.359 --> 0:20:20.480 was an electronics and components manufacturing company. So we've simplified 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:24.600 things dramatically at this point from a corporate structure point 0:20:24.600 --> 0:20:30.120 of view. In Magnavox introduced the first of its FM tuners, 0:20:30.480 --> 0:20:34.040 which had the name of cright, because these model names, 0:20:34.040 --> 0:20:38.359 they're great, really easy to remember. Now, keep in mind, 0:20:38.400 --> 0:20:42.720 AM radio uses a carrier wave of a specific frequency 0:20:42.960 --> 0:20:48.120 somewhere between five forty to sixty killer hurts and uh. 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:53.480 You encode information on this carrier wave by varying or 0:20:53.640 --> 0:20:58.119 modulating the amplitude of that wave. So if you were 0:20:58.160 --> 0:21:02.200 to visualize a wave plotted on a chart, this would 0:21:02.200 --> 0:21:05.080 mean that you are changing the height of the peaks 0:21:05.119 --> 0:21:08.040 and the depth of the troughs. And by doing this 0:21:08.440 --> 0:21:11.399 you can encode information on top of a carrier wave. 0:21:12.000 --> 0:21:16.480 And by demodulating it, by essentially taking the carrier wave 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:21.520 out of it, you're left with the modulation part that 0:21:21.520 --> 0:21:26.120 that represents the original information. In this case audio like 0:21:26.240 --> 0:21:31.720 you know radio waves, So FM radio that is frequency modulation. 0:21:31.960 --> 0:21:34.800 That means we take a carrier wave, this time in 0:21:34.840 --> 0:21:39.560 the eight mega hurts range, and we vary or modulate 0:21:39.840 --> 0:21:43.320 the frequency of the wave to encode information on those waves. 0:21:43.760 --> 0:21:47.960 FM radio had better audio quality or fidelity, and it 0:21:48.080 --> 0:21:50.560 first had emerged in the nineteen thirties, but took a 0:21:50.640 --> 0:21:54.640 while for companies to start creating consumer radios that had 0:21:54.840 --> 0:21:58.720 FM tuning capability to them. This was also around the 0:21:58.720 --> 0:22:01.280 time that the United States got involved in World War Two, 0:22:01.440 --> 0:22:04.399 and again, like with the First World War, companies in 0:22:04.440 --> 0:22:08.439 America began shifting focus to create products and components to 0:22:08.520 --> 0:22:12.320 support the war effort. Magnavox was no different and in 0:22:12.400 --> 0:22:16.119 fact received the first Navy E Award that was given 0:22:16.160 --> 0:22:20.359 to an electronics manufacturer That happened in ninety two. What 0:22:20.520 --> 0:22:23.680 was Magnavox producing well, largely kept on making the stuff 0:22:23.720 --> 0:22:26.600 it was known for, loud speakers and the components needed 0:22:26.640 --> 0:22:29.600 to drive them, and those were incredibly useful in military 0:22:29.680 --> 0:22:33.760 vehicles like large ships and submarines and aircraft. At the 0:22:33.840 --> 0:22:37.040 end of the war, Magnavox refocused on the consumer market 0:22:37.480 --> 0:22:40.480 and the post World War two era would really be 0:22:40.520 --> 0:22:43.560 the golden years for Magnavox. In general, the post war 0:22:43.600 --> 0:22:47.040 economy in America was really really strong. You had all 0:22:47.040 --> 0:22:49.760 these returning soldiers who were able to take advantage of 0:22:49.800 --> 0:22:53.159 government programs to establish a new life for themselves state side. 0:22:53.680 --> 0:22:57.760 Uh And just to clarify, the returning white soldiers were 0:22:57.760 --> 0:23:00.840 really able to take advantage of those programs. Other soldiers, 0:23:01.000 --> 0:23:04.440 while technically being eligible for that same sort of aid, 0:23:05.160 --> 0:23:09.639 found themselves effectively excluded from taking advantage of the programs 0:23:09.840 --> 0:23:12.399 due to various policies that were you know, when you 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:15.359 get down to it racist, but that's a subject for 0:23:15.400 --> 0:23:17.760 another podcast. It just feel we have to acknowledge it, 0:23:18.160 --> 0:23:21.160 because if you don't acknowledge it, you are just denying 0:23:21.240 --> 0:23:25.639 something that was a very important and painful part of history. Anyway, 0:23:25.680 --> 0:23:29.119 for Magnavox, the company, this meant that a return to 0:23:29.119 --> 0:23:32.280 consumer electronics came right as the demand was on the 0:23:32.400 --> 0:23:35.399 rise for them. In fact, demand was high enough that 0:23:35.440 --> 0:23:38.479 the company decided to make another important acquisition, and this 0:23:38.520 --> 0:23:43.080 time it wasn't an electronics company now. Instead, Magnavox opened 0:23:43.119 --> 0:23:46.520 up a new subsidiary to build out the cabinets that 0:23:46.560 --> 0:23:51.040 would house radios. Now, remember, in these days, pre transistor 0:23:51.119 --> 0:23:55.520 radios were pretty big. Even the tabletop models were hefty, 0:23:55.840 --> 0:23:58.600 and a lot of home models were effectively full pieces 0:23:58.640 --> 0:24:02.359 of furniture, like almost you know, a full set of 0:24:02.440 --> 0:24:05.280 drawers or a hutch or something. They were enormous. So 0:24:05.359 --> 0:24:09.760 your average radio consisted of electronic components that the manufacturer 0:24:09.880 --> 0:24:14.160 would then mount inside a wooden cabinet. So Magnavox opened 0:24:14.200 --> 0:24:18.240 up the Greenville Cabinet Company in Greenville, Tennessee in ninety 0:24:18.320 --> 0:24:22.280 seven to design and build the cabinetry that would house 0:24:22.320 --> 0:24:26.359 Magnavox radio sets. Not only was there a strong market 0:24:26.359 --> 0:24:29.320 for radios, there was the temptation to get into another 0:24:29.440 --> 0:24:36.199 fledgling technology, television. Electronic television's predated World War Two, but 0:24:36.600 --> 0:24:39.560 the war had pretty much put TV evolution on hold 0:24:39.640 --> 0:24:43.680 for several years. Magnavux joined in the TV craze after 0:24:43.720 --> 0:24:47.080