Edgar Villchur 1917-2011

A

Allan Black

Veteran
Unfortunately it looks like we're living at a time where some of the pioneers of everyday things we take for granted are passing.

I've got to say when you read their stories most of them would rise to the heights of any field they worked in and Edgar Villchur certainly joins that esteemed group ..

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/18/business/edgar-m-villchur-hi-fi-innovator-dies-at-94.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Villchur

And Oct 17 was the day my three week old great grandson was diagnosed as profoundly deaf, that means no hearing at all. My sister and his family are coming to grips with the sad news and as his uncle with 50yrs in the sound recording biz .. I'm just devastated.

Coincidently Edgar Villchur worked in the field of hearing research and developed the modern hearing aid and I'm doing a job about 2 blocks away from the NSW Deaf Institute for Children.

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Thank you for posting this. I'm very sad for your grandson and his family. I'm shure you already know the
Oliver Sacks book "Seeing voices". If not I think it could be very helpful in this moment.
 
Back in the 1970s, I read a slim little book Villchur wrote about loudspeaker design and other topics related to the hi-fi systems of the time -- one of the really fundamental pieces of literature in my little technical library back then. Aside from being an excellent and creative engineer, he was a clear and concise writer and able to describe thoroughly and accurately how his inventions worked without resorting to too much math or dense theory. Along with Henry Kloss, he was one of the most significant inventors in the audio field we ever had.

- GDS
 
I owned a pair of Acoustic Research AR-3's back in the 60's, probably the best speakers you could buy then. They cost much less than the big iron (Klipsch), were a fraction of the size and sounded better.
 
Curtis, in 1993 as testimony to the 'breakthroughs of speaker technology' an AR-3 speaker was placed on permanent display in the Smithsonian in Washington DC. So their ears are as good as yours mate.

Greg, imagine, Edgar and Henry couldn't wait to get to the plant every day, probably couldn't even wait for their coffee. Everyone should get the chance to work in an atmosphere like that.

Francesco, I didn't know about 'Seeing Voices', I've made enquiries and there's reprint coming Dec 1st, so thanks.

The hearing diagnosis was made at 3 weeks and apparently there's a faint possibility of birth fluid but the thought he has 'no signal' at all is ..

That he can't hear his mother singing to him is too much for me.

Thanks for your replies and thoughts.

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