Raymond A. Litke

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (April 2012)

Raymond A. Litke (1920-1986) was an American electronic engineer, the inventor of a wireless microphone and other electronic devices. He was born and raised on a farm near Alma, Kansas, but spent most of his adult life in San Jose, California.

His design for a wireless microphone was more useful for entertainers and reporters, a major improvement for news reporting and entertainment.

Wireless microphone

Litke invented a wireless microphone in 1957 while employed as an electronics expert at San Jose State College. His supervisor challenged him to invent a microphone to use in educational presentations which would be free of wires.

Litke’s wireless mike resembled a silver tube with “a microphone at the top, a transmitter in the middle and its battery power supply at the bottom.”^[1] It was 6 inches long, 1 inch in diameter, and weighed 7 ounces; the device had a broadcast range of up to a half-mile. Two types of mikes were available: lavalier and hand-held. A companion receiver, weighing 17 pounds, completed the portable sound system.^[2]

Although Litke prototyped the wireless microphone in 1957, he did not file for a patent until 1960. U.S. Patent No. 3,134,074 was officially granted on May 8, 1961. His microphone is sometimes also called the “Vega-Mike” after the Vega Electronics Corporation which first manufactured it as a product. Vega sold other electronics items and tapes developed by Litke.^[3][4].

Litke's wireless microphone was first tested at the Olympic trials held at Stanford University in 1959.^[5] Next, the American Broadcasting Company (ABC television) tested the microphone at the Democratic and Republican Conventions in 1960. ^[6] Candidates John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon were among the first celebrities to use the Vega-Mike. TV anchor John Daly praised Litke's invention on the ABC television news broadcast in July 1960. Daly introduced it to Americans with the words: "This is a Vega-Mike" and went on to explain it "is a wireless microphone, six inches long... without any wires of any kind...." Daly pointed out it could be used to broadcast "within the (convention) hall or outside... without the inconvenience of interconnecting microphone cables...."^[7][8]

Other accomplishments

In the 1960s Litke worked at the University of California Medical Center in San Francisco as the chief engineer of Educational Television and as an electronics expert. While there, he developed medical devices which included the fiber-optic colonoscope. NASA employed Ampex to do the audio/visual equipment for the Apollo missions. Litke was hired as a consultant to help with the design of the video gear.^{[citation needed]}

References