RETRO FRIDAY: JACK MULLIN DISCOVERS THE TAPE RECORDER

Today we have a real blast from the past. In 2000 one of our consulting clients was the Stanley Foundation in Muscatine, Iowa. At that time the foundation was producing a weekly radio news program called Common Ground. 

We occasionally produced segments for Common Ground about media around the world.

At that time we were also doing consulting work for the Pavek Museum of Broadcasting [link] in Minneapolis. 

One of the Museum’s world-class treasures is a German AEG Magnetophone, perhaps the world’s first reel-to-reel tape recorder. We decided to do a segment about it for Common Ground.

We call it Jack Mullin’s Prize... 

It tells the true story of the “discovery” of the tape recorder by Jack Mullin who was serving in the U.S. Army Signal Corps during World War 2.

Just after the war in Europe ended in May 1945, Mullin was assigned to investigate German war-related electronics. Before and during the war Germany had perfected reel-to-reel tape machines.  Mullin didn't know about the German invention until he "discovered" it.

In July 1945, the Army sent Mullin to inspect a site near Frankfurt, where the Germans had been experimenting with high-energy radio beams as a  weapon.

Mullin & his “Magnetophone”

Mullin was a huge fan of radio and he made a stop at a German radio station in the town of Bad Nauheim. At the station he saw and heard the AEG ‘’Magnetophone.’' It was capable of recording and playing-back pristine quality audio.  Mullin was amazed and he took two of the units, plus fifty rolls unused recording tape, as a “prize of war.”

Mullin shipped the booty piece-by-piece back to his home in San Francisco where he later rebuilt and modified the machines.

Radio star Bing Crosby heard about Mullin’s amazing tape machines. He was fascinated by the chance to have high-quality, editable, recordings of his show.

Crosby agreed to invest in Mullin's machines. Mullin parlayed the investment into a stake in Ampex.

Mullin’s “prize” revolutionized audio recording.  Mullin and Ampex would move on the video tape.

You can hear our story on YouTube: