Kloss and his KLH

[Guest Droog]

I've been wondering why Henry Kloss did not continue his audio work at KLH, instead moving on to develope Advent and Cambridge Soundworks. The impact of KLH was and it's products was truly amazing, qaulity radios, phonogaghs, receivers, tape players not to mention a cataloge of speakers ranging from small single driver units (model eleven) to large complicated models such as the #12. One of the most amazing things about KLH was that they were vertically integrated, winding their own voice coils, making their own paper for speaker cones, pressing their own surrounds. They even put into business a metal stamping and screw machine for speaker housings. All this for a company that was producing speakers at a pretty high volume, at least 100,000 units a year? Just think, the model six was in house product with a production run of 15 years and a best seller with about 1/4 million units made in that time period ! I know of no other major speaker company that did this, not even Acoustic Research. It does seem that Kloss did go for a re-start to get back to a smaller more defined product line by leaving his company, maybe KLH just got to big and corporate. The early 80s sell out to a Korean electronics firm is like the fate of so many American HiFi companies. Never again will we see anything like those dynamic years of audio developement of the 60s and a company called KLH!

[Guest russwollman]

Highly dynamic, creative people like Henry Kloss like to keep moving. That's the reason, I think, why he didn't stick around with KLH. Minds like his move very quickly; they're always searching.

I heard that he came up with the Advent design in the short span of a weekend!

I have just come upon a Model 21 radio with the extra speaker. This is a lovely thing both to see and to hear. And I remember being very impressed with the Model 6 loudspeaker.

You're absolutely right, the likes of KLH will be hard to find again.

[soundminded]

Perhaps it was because by selling it to Singer Corporation in the 1970s, Kloss made a bundle of money. There's nothing like a big cash incentive to get you to sell out. KLH has never been the same since. And there's nothing like a huge corporation taking over a fine small company to buy its name, try out its recent MBA grads to see how they do on something they don't care too much about, and trash it.

[Andy]

When AUDIO MAGAZINE took a tour of the KLH facility in early 1958 not many had heard of this company which had been started by ex AR cofounder Henry Kloss in 1957. They comment that the product developement was a very impressive, they were even making their own speaker cones and noted that the only other speaker company which was doing this was Bozak. The review of the just released Model Six, "It is capable of performance which we have come to think of as unbeivable for so small a cabinet".

In 1964 when Singer bought KLH, the eventual die was cast, but since Kloss stayed on until 1967 overseeing product developement, many great speakers and audio were still to come....speaker Models 5,12,16,17,22,23 and those modular systems 15,19,20,24,26. And if you want a fine solid state 1960's table radio, the model 21 is the only choice. Singer had infused serious money into These products, they carried the company until about 1972.

The final nails were driven into the KLH coffin with products like the Model 56 speaker, I was surprised to see the KLH logo on this flimsy vinyl clad speaker. The Cambridge glory was fast disapearing , the rest is history. It doesn't matter how large a company you are, you have to make cutting edge audio. I might be wrong, but I can't think of anything cutting edge from KLH in the 1972-1980 era.