Hearing Aid
date: label: date made
content: ca. 1904
notes: label: Description
content: Miller Reese Hutchison (1877-1944) was an electrical engineer from Alabama who, while working in New York City, invented a carbon microphone hearing aid which he termed the Acousticon. The Hutchison Acoustic Co. showed two hearing aids, the Acousticon and the Massicon, at the St. Louis International Exhibition of 1904.
label: Description
content: In 1905 Hutchison transferred the rights for the Acousticon to Kelly Monroe Turner (1859–1927), proprietor of the General Acoustic Company. Turner went on to improve hearing aids and apply the technology to other products. One such was the dictograph, an early inter-office intercom system. By 1919, the General Acoustic Company had become the Dictograph Products Company, and Acousticon had become a division of that firm.
label: Description
content: An inscription on the case of this early example reads “ACOUSTICON / GENERAL ACOUSTIC COMPANY / NEW YORK CITY.”
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
setName: label: See more items in
content: Medicine and Science: Medicine
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2012.0165.682
label: accession number
content: 2012.0165
label: catalog number
content: 2012.0165.682
objectType: label: Object Name
content: hearing aid
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 3/4 in x 3 1/4 in; 1.905 cm x 8.255 cm