bell labs and western electric

[valhallax]

can someone give or guide me to the history of the connection between bell labs and western electric? shared patents? shared engineering?
i know that bell had a huge budget for engineering, being interested in vocal reproduction. i have harvey fletchers book 'speech and hearing' kind of a hard read, but very many interesting things in it. what was really cool was the articulation they were looking for even in individual constanant or syllable accuracy. it shows pictures of them speaking across a gas flame and analizing the shape. recording large clusters of musicians gathered around a huge horn to record on a dictograph. lots of interesting facts on human voice travel and the such.

[GM]

Here's some basic time lines that ~answers your Q: http://web.archive.org/web/200310032...evolution.html

http://web.archive.org/web/200308180...bell-labs.html

http://web.archive.org/web/200609030...udspeaker.html

GM

[Tom Brennan]

They were both part of the phone company; basically Bell Labs was research and Western Electric was manufacturing.

[Old Guy]

Originally posted by Tom Brennan:
They were both part of the phone company; basically Bell Labs was research and Western Electric was manufacturing.

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">Tom definitely knows where it's ATT.

[robertbartsch]

The old Altec Lansing marketing materials from the 1970s often mentioned their heritage going back to the Bell labs days and my recollection was that Bell held the first patents on edge wound voice coils and Alnico motors.

The "other" Lansing cite has some interesting history on the early Altec days.

LANSING HERITAGE

[Horn Savant]

[url="http://web.archive.org/web/20030818094212/history.acusd.edu/gen/recording/bell-labs.html"]
GM

GM, Anyone-- Do you know what plant WE used to manufacture the 555, 594, 597 speakers ?

Where were they made ?

[Panomaniac]

And while we are on the subject - what about Westrex? It was the UK arm of W.E., but the drivers look a bit different. What's the story?

[GM]

GM, Anyone-- Do you know what plant WE used to manufacture the 555, 594, 597 speakers ?

I assume the huge Hawthorne plant near Chicago where the first manufacturing facility PA system was installed since IIRC I read somewhere that by then it was the only one left in the US, becoming a self sufficient 'city' in its own right.

GM

[LICORNE]

Westrex were into 35mm optical ,dolby digital and sdds film recorders and 35mm mag recorders player.They stopped manufacturing these equipment in 2006.

[Horn Savant]

I assume the huge Hawthorne plant.

GM

It's funny how no one knows for sure , I've heard some say New Jersey.

This, for me, deepens the mystery and esoteric attraction for these rare, desirable speakers and Amps.