Science: Having Wonderful Time

Recorded music is getting better. Part of the credit goes to improved electronic devices, part to engineers who combine technical knowledge with artistic temperament. One of these latter rare specimens is John Hays Hammond Jr., 58, America's gaudiest inventor and holder of nearly 800 patents. Last week he was tuning his latest gadget: an improved "dynamic amplifier," which coaxes uncannily lifelike music out of phonograph records. It was already licensed to RCA and A.T. & T., this month would be demonstrated to the crowned heads of the phonograph industry.

Hammond did not start from scratch. His father, John Hays Hammond Sr., was...

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