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Telephone switchboard operators began using headphones with quarter-inch jacks as they answered and directed calls.
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French engineer Ernest Jules Pierre Mercadier received a U.S. patent for ear buds for use as telephone receivers.
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Electrical engineer Nathaniel Baldwin develops and creates headphones.
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Some very sensitive headphones were commonly used for early radio work.
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Company Beyerdynamic officially invented headphones and commercialized them. John C. Kross invented first stereo headphones. He also invented a phonograph that incorporated a speaker and headphone jacks.
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Sony Corp. released its hand-held EFM-117J radio, an early use of the smaller 3.5mm headphone-jack socket. Sony launched its first personal stereo Walkman, the “TPS-L2,” making headphones ubiquitous.
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Sony launched its first personal stereo Walkman, the “TPS-L2,” making headphones ubiquitous.
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Dutch inventor Jaap Haartsen performed early research on Bluetooth Wireless Technology and filed an important patent.
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Telecom vendor Ericsson AB launched Bluetooth commercially, allowing data to be exchanged over short distances using radio waves.
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Sony unveiled the first digital noise-canceling headphone. This set, called MDR-NC500D, could block 99% of noise in the 160HZ range, almost the range of a jet engine.
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Apple removes the headphone jack. Users will be able to plug headphones into the iPhone 7’s lightning port, or purchase a pair of wireless ear buds, called Apple AirPods, for $159.
