20 Facts About Henry Kloss

Henry Kloss was a prominent American audio engineer and entrepreneur who helped advance high fidelity loudspeaker and radio receiver technology beginning in the 1950s.

Henry Kloss was responsible for a number of innovations, including, in part, the acoustic suspension loudspeaker and the high fidelity cassette deck.

In 2000, Henry Kloss was one of the first inductees into the Consumer Electronics Association's Hall of Fame.

Henry Kloss earned an Emmy Award for his development of a projection television system, the Advent VideoBeam 1000.

Henry Kloss was assigned to work in New Jersey, and took a night course in high fidelity taught by Edgar Villchur at New York University.

Henry Kloss was an early adopter of new technology, including the transistor, Dolby noise reduction, and chromium dioxide magnetic recording tape.

Henry Kloss co-founded Acoustic Research, Inc with Edgar Villchur in the summer of 1954.

Villchur, a former teacher of Henry Kloss, had designed what he called the "acoustic suspension" loudspeaker, an elegant solution to the problem of bass harmonic distortion.

At Cambridge-based KLH, Henry Kloss continued to build speakers such as the classic KLH Model Five and Six, and produced one of the first small FM radios with high selectivity, the Model Eight.

Henry Kloss created the first transistorized record player, the KLH Model Eleven.

Around 1968, Henry Kloss had quit KLH to develop a low-cost projection television, but had trouble financing the leading-edge research and development that was still required.

In 1977, Henry Kloss founded Henry Kloss Video Corporation as a spin-off company.

Henry Kloss invented the Novatron tube there, which increased the efficiency of projection TVs Having pioneered large-screen video projection systems, Kloss found himself undercut by lower-cost models from Japan, and he eventually shut down his company.

Henry Kloss left Cambridge SoundWorks in 1997, and the company became a subsidiary of Creative Technology.

Former Cambridge SoundWorks co-founder Tom DeVesto founded Tivoli Audio in 2000 to sell a new table radio which Henry Kloss designed after a brief retirement.

Henry Kloss was sometimes seen riding an old bicycle on the streets of Cambridge, or driving an old but durable car.

Henry Kloss usually dressed informally in well-worn clothes, and had a direct, pragmatic approach to problem-solving.

Henry Kloss's offices were cluttered with equipment and circuit boards, and he wore his gray hair pulled back out of the way in a ponytail.

Henry Kloss died suddenly of a subdural hematoma on January 31,2002.

Henry Kloss was survived by a son, two daughters, and seven grandchildren.