Chinaradioswl: History of Turner Microphones

mercredi 19 juin 2024

History of Turner Microphones

http://www.cbgazette.com/history_tommoss-turner.html

The Turner Microphone company was founded by David Turner and Everett Foster in Cedar Rapids, Iowa in 1931. The company soon began making microphones and public address systems. Turner opened a larger factory in 1936 and produced a large quantity of microphones and grew to 1200 employees by the 1970s. The company was sold to Telex in 1978 and ceased operations in 1979.^[3

https://www.thegazette.com/community/history-happenings-cedar-rapids-company-led-the-way-on-microphones/

https://www.radiomuseum.org/dsp_hersteller_detail.cfm?company_id=3660

The Turner Co. Cedar Rapids Iowa, USA: David Turner was working on an idea for producing public address systems for funeral homes like his father operated. The basement workshop effort of 1931 was to blossom into quite an industry. The company was famous with their microphones. In the mid-1930’s, David Turner developed a pressure embalming system that revolutionized the little-discussed art. The pressure system of introducing the embalming fluid replaced the old-fashioned gravity flow system.

1936 "The Turner Co." built the first part of its factory in northeast Cedar Rapids and soon it had to expand (in two steps). In 1940 there were about 35 employees. During World War II employment jumped to 210 (about 85 percent were women). An extra building was leased at 1443 First avenue SE. (Now occupied by "The Music Loft." The plant on Seventeenth street was enlarged in 1946. Evans became president of the Company in 1946 when David Turner assumed the chairmanship of the company's board of directors.

1950 the Turner Company in Cedar Rapids manufactured 80,000 microphones and 1,093 embalming machines.

In 1967 the Turner Co. became a wholly owned subsidiary of Conrac Corp. and in December 1971 became a division of Conrac. The Turner Division’s line of microphones were then made for use in communications systems, such as two-way radios, citizen band equipment and ham radio operations; all kinds of microphones for public address systems; and professional broadcast and recording microphones, for radio and television stations, recording studios and the like.

In August 1979, Conrac sold it Telex Corporation. A scant three months later all production at the main plant, 716 Oakland Rd., in Cedar Rapids was discontinued and relocated to Telex facilities in Minnesota and Oklahoma.