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Gil, On reflection you may be right that Fairchild could have built more than one K-Horn. From the December 27, 1941 New Yorker profile by Geoffrey T. Hellman we have this: "being fond of music, Fairchild has furnished his Long Island house [note, this is the Lloyd Neck house, distinct from the Manhattan town house] with a radio equipped with a loudspeaker intended for a twelve-hundred-seat-theatre..." Also, in reference to the date of completion of the town house,...from the same profile we have this: "Fairchild gave up his triplex apartment a year or so ago and moved to a modernistic house he had built on East Sixty-Fifth Street." This would seem to date the completion of the town house slightly earlier than I thought. As to the drivers in the unit I saw, I believe I was told they were Western Electric drivers and at least one of the motors (I think it was the woofer) was energized by a field coil instead of a permanent magnet. Like other forum members I've been interested in Klipschorns and Fairchild for many years. However, I am no expert. I hope that a forum member who knows more of the particulars of this speaker or of Fairchild will be willing to step forward and give us some more information. Unfortunately Dick Long (who had the unit in his possession)has been dead for a number of years. In 1995 in an attempt to get additional information I contacted Robert Damora who was still alive and had taken the pictures for the Archtectural Forum piece. I wanted to know if there were additional unpublished pictures that he would be willing to sell. Damora, who had become a noted architect in his own right, remembered Fairchild, the town house and the assignment. He did not remember if there were any unpublished photos. At that time he was in his eighties and said he thought he still had the negatives, but if he had them they were in storage, and he had no easy means of finding them. He was very friendly, seemed like a great guy, and I could not bring myself to press him any further for the pictures. I have since seen that the Yale school of Architecture had an exhibition of Damora's work. So perhaps there is a curator out there with additional photos of the Fairchild K-Horn. Thanks for posting the article. Peter

Gil, Re 4/3 scaleup. To make this as clear as I can: In the winter of 1964 or 1965 I saw what was purported to be Sherman Fairchild's old KHorn. I've described what I remember of the speaker in arlier post a couple of years ago. I did not see it in the townhouse. The bass horn was notably larger than that of a style D that was next to it. The fellow who claimed he had gotten it from Fairchild also said, in my recollection, that it was 4/3 the size of the style D and that it had an 18 inch driver in it. As you probably know Fairchild had been a president of the AES, had contacts with everyone, and appeared to delight in being an early adopter and purveyor of all kinds of technology. I don't doubt that he had this horn built in the very early forties in consultation with Klipsch. While the townhouse was featured in Architectural forum in 1943, I believe it was completed at the end of 1941. I'm guessing that would be a pretty good ballpark date for the construction of the speaker. Peter

Chris, It was from the same article which Gil has posted in full (the April 1943 issue of Architectural Forum). Peter

For slightly more info on Fairchild's speaker see my old thread from 02-19-04. A fellow named Dick Long had a pair of style D khorns and had just bought Fairchild's speaker. He placed an ad in the NY Times to sell one of the D's and I went to see it. This was winter of '64 or '65. I am now very sure that Dick Long was Richard Long of Richard Long Associates of Disco sound-system fame. The woofer cabinet was a scaled up 4/3 version of the commercial production k-horns...similar in size I believe to the Patrician cabinets. This was prior to disco and Long demonstrated the Fairchild speaker and one of the D's by playing the death scene from Tosca. I recall Long was particularly impressed at the accuracy of the reproduced soundstage when Tosca leaps to her death. There are a few recordings that were made in Fairchild's living room still available. One that to my ear is of very high quality is "Midnight Hour Blues" with Larry Johnson and John Hammond Jr. Also available on the web is an early fifties recording of Hoagy Carmichael and Marian McPartland made during a party at Fairchild's house. The house was at 17 E. 65th St. The last time I went by (in the '90s) it's facade had changed greatly, and apparently an additional floor had been added. Peter

John, This speaker was built prior to April '43, therefore preceded commercial production. My understanding... it was a collaboration between Fairchild & PWK. I believe I saw this speaker in the mid sixties after Fairchild had gotten rid of it. My understanding at that time was that it had an 18" woofer. The mid horn (WE?) I saw had a right angle bend at the throat so the driver was below the top of the bass horn, and it had a conical horn tweeter that I now think was a very rare and desireable WE design. I think at least one of the drivers used a field coil instead of a permanent magnet because there was a hefty power supply that went with it. I heard it with Marantz tube amps (whichever has the triode/pentode switch on it...model 2 or 5. The fellow who had it, demonstrated it with a then current model D (with K5 mid and K77 tweeter as the other stereo channel. He said he liked Fairchild's speaker better, but I was unable to hear the difference. I started this thread because I've always wondered where that speaker ended up. I kind of remember that PWK made some reference (in some article from long ago) to this speaker and the outstanding acoustics of Fairchild's livingroom. Just thought some Klipsch historians might know about this stuff. Peter

I've been lurking on the Klipsch Forum for a few years. I bought my first Khorn (used) in 1961. Currently have 3 Khorns... s/n 243, 450, and 808. Wondered if anyone has more information about the speaker in the attached pictures from page 41 of the April 1943 issue of Architectural Forum. This speaker was located in the Manhattan town house of Sherman Fairchild (one time AES president, and manufacturer of among other things Fairchild cartridges, turntables, amps, cameras,planes, and semiconductors). Forgive me if this is a topic that's already been discussed. Peter