Jack Mullin
Jack Mullin | |
---|---|
Born | John Thomas Mullin October 5, 1913 |
Died | June 24, 1999 Camarillo, California, U.S. | (aged 85)
Alma mater | Santa Clara University |
Occupation | Electrical engineer |
John Thomas Mullin (October 5, 1913 – June 24, 1999) was an
Work with the Signal Corps
By 1943, German engineers had developed a high-quality form of magnetic tape sound recording that was unknown elsewhere. The Nazi radio networks used it to broadcast music and propaganda around the clock.
From their monitoring of Nazi radio broadcasts during World War II, the Allies knew that German radio studios had some new kind of recorder that could reproduce high-fidelity sound in segments of unheard-of length, up to 15 minutes duration. But for several years, they didn't know what these machines were or how they worked, and it was not until Germany fell to the Allies during 1944-45 that the Americans discovered the new magnetic tape recorders. Mullin saw the potential of the new technology and developed it immediately after the war.
Mullin served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps during World War II. He was posted to Paris in the final months of the war, where his unit was assigned to find out everything they could about German radio and electronics. They found and collected hundreds of low-quality field dictating machines but the major discovery came when Mullin visited Germany just before the end of the war. He was sent to inspect a site near Frankfurt, where the Germans had reputedly been experimenting with using directed high-energy radio beams as means of disabling the ignition systems of flying aircraft. He said that when he heard the Magnetophon used by Radio Frankfurt: "I really flipped. I couldn't tell whether it was live or playback. There simply was no background noise."[2]
On his way back home to San Francisco, Mullin made a chance stopover at a nearby German radio station at
Stateside career
Mullin gave two public demonstrations of his machines in Hollywood in 1947, in which he first presented live music performed behind a curtain, followed by a concealed playback of the performance. Mullin's recorder caused a sensation among American audio professionals and many listeners could not tell the difference between the recorded and live performances. By luck, Mullin's second demonstration was at
Crosby was impressed by the amazing sound quality and instantly saw the huge commercial potential of the new machines.[3] Up to this time, most pre-recorded programming such as serials and drama were produced on disc, but live music was the standard for American radio at the time and radio networks tightly restricted the use of music on disc because of the comparatively poor sound quality.
Crosby, who was arguably the biggest star on radio at the time, was very receptive to the idea of pre-recording his radio programs. He disliked the regimentation of live broadcasts, and much preferred the relaxed atmosphere of the
Crosby became the first major music star to master commercial recordings on tape, and the first to use tape to pre-record radio broadcasts. The shows were painstakingly edited to give them a pace and flow that was wholly unprecedented in radio. Mullin has claimed that he even pioneered the use of the laugh track; at the insistence of Crosby's writer Bill Morrow, he inserted a segment of raucous laughter from an earlier show to follow a joke in a later show that had not worked well.
Keen to make use of the new recorders as soon as possible, Crosby invested $50,000 in a local electronics firm, Ampex, and the tiny six-man concern soon became the world leader in the development of tape recording. Ampex revolutionized the radio and recording industry with its famous Model 200 tape deck, developed directly from Mullin's modified Magnetophones. Crosby gave one of the first production models to musician Les Paul, which led directly to Paul's invention of multitrack recording.[4]
Working with Mullin, Ampex rapidly developed two-track stereo and then three-track recorders. Spurred on by Crosby's move into TV in the early 1950s, Mullin and Ampex developed a working monochrome
Through the rest of his life, Mullin continued to follow new ideas. He also kept an impressive collection of early recording hardware, which was donated in 1990 to the Pavek Museum of Broadcasting.[5]
Mullin died of heart failure at his Camarillo, California home.[6]
See also
- John Herbert Orr
- Richard H. Ranger
- Charles Douglass
- Laugh track
- BCE Electronic Division
References
- ^ Budman, Scott. "Uncovering the story of Jack Mullin". Santa Clara University. Retrieved 4 May 2016.
- ^ Burgess, Richard James (2014). The History of Music Production. Oxford University Press. p. 45.
- ^ Ravo, Nick (3 July 1999). "John Mullin, 85, Whose Magnetic Tape Freed Radio Broadcasters". The New York Times.
- ISSN 0164-9957.
- ^ "Jack Mullin collection". Pavek Museum of Broadcasting. Retrieved 4 May 2016.
- ^ Oliver, Myrna (1 July 1999). "John Mullin; U.S. Pioneer in Tape-Recording Technology". Los Angeles Times.
External links
- Sound Man: WWII to MP3 at IMDb
- "Jack Mullin Recounts Discovery of AEG Magnetophon" on YouTube
- Jack Mullin at Find a Grave