James B. Lansing: The Turbulent Genius Who Forged the JBL Sound

The name JBL resonates worldwide, synonymous with powerful, high-fidelity sound in homes, cinemas, concert halls, and recording studios. But behind the iconic logo lies the complex story of its founder, James Bullough Lansing, a man whose engineering prowess fundamentally shaped the audio landscape.

Born James Martini in rural Illinois in 1902, young Jim displayed an early aptitude for all things electrical and mechanical. By age 10, he’d built a Leyden jar; by 12, a radio transmitter powerful enough to attract government attention. After briefly living with the Bullough family, he later adopted their name, legally changing his own to James Bullough Lansing just before embarking on his defining venture. Following his mother’s death in 1924, Lansing moved west, eventually landing in Salt Lake City where he met engineer Ken Decker. The two formed a partnership and, in 1927, moved to Los Angeles to establish the Lansing Manufacturing Company, initially producing 6- and 8-inch speaker drivers for the burgeoning radio market. The fledgling company operated partly as a family affair, hand-crafting components at home before factory assembly.

The dawn of “talkies” in the late 1920s shifted the audio world’s focus to motion pictures. While Western Electric (through its ERPI division) initially dominated cinema sound with large horn systems, their limitations frustrated some. Douglas Shearer, head of MGM’s sound department, felt he could do better. In 1933, Shearer assembled a crack team including John Hilliard and Robert Stephens, identifying the nearby Lansing Manufacturing Company as a promising source for advanced loudspeaker components.

This collaboration resulted in the revolutionary Shearer-MGM system. Lansing designed the potent high-frequency compression drivers (initially modeled after Western Electric designs, later refined to avoid patent issues) and robust 15-inch woofers. Housed in large multicellular high-frequency horns and W-type bass enclosures built by MGM, the system set a new benchmark for cinema sound fidelity, earning an Academy Award for technical excellence in 1937 and influencing speaker designs worldwide. During this period, Lansing also developed the smaller, highly successful two-way “Iconic” system, widely adopted as a studio monitor.

Despite these technical triumphs, tragedy struck in 1939 when Ken Decker, Lansing’s vital business partner, was killed in an airplane crash. Without Decker’s management acumen, Lansing Manufacturing struggled financially. Simultaneously, a government antitrust action forced Western Electric to divest its motion picture sound holdings, leading to the formation of Altec Service Corporation by former WE engineers. Seeing Lansing’s predicament, Altec Service principals George Carrington and E. L. Conrow proposed a merger. On December 4, 1941, Altec Service Corporation purchased Lansing Manufacturing for $50,000, renaming the entity Altec Lansing Corporation. James B. Lansing signed a five-year contract, becoming Vice President of Engineering.

When his contract expired in 1946, Lansing departed Altec Lansing to pursue his own vision once more. He founded Lansing Sound, Inc., soon renamed James B. Lansing Sound, Incorporated – the company that would become JBL. Initial offerings included the D101 woofer and D175 high-frequency driver, closely resembling Altec Lansing products. However, the legendary D130 15-inch driver, featuring a groundbreaking 4-inch flat ribbon wire voice coil and potent Alnico V magnet (sourced through a key relationship with Arnold Engineering), marked JBL’s first truly original and enduring design.

But Lansing, the brilliant engineer, remained a challenged businessman. Facing mounting debts and production difficulties in the late 1940s, and possibly battling personal demons, James B. Lansing tragically took his own life on September 4, 1949. The company’s future seemed bleak, but Lansing had presciently named the company beneficiary on a $10,000 life insurance policy. This allowed Vice President Bill Thomas to keep the company operational. Thomas soon bought out Mrs. Lansing’s share, becoming sole owner and ushering in an era of revitalization and growth.

Under Thomas’s leadership, the company officially adopted the JBL brand name with its distinctive exclamation point in 1955 to differentiate itself from Altec Lansing. Guided by talented engineers like Ed May and Bart Locanthi, JBL introduced iconic products like the 375 high-frequency driver (a powerful evolution of WE designs) and the 075 “bullet” ring-radiator tweeter. Landmark speaker systems like the Hartsfield and the striking Paragon cemented JBL’s reputation in the high-end market.

In 1969, Thomas sold JBL to the Jervis Corporation, later Harman International. The 1970s saw JBL achieve unprecedented mainstream success, largely fueled by the L-100 loudspeaker – the best-selling speaker model of its time. JBL simultaneously solidified its dominance in professional audio, becoming the monitor of choice in recording studios worldwide by the late 70s. The company continued to innovate, expanding into tour sound, becoming a key player in cinema audio (influencing the THX standard), and eventually offering diverse lines ranging from mass-market consumer speakers to ultra-high-end project systems like Everest and K2.

James B. Lansing’s life was marked by incredible highs and devastating lows, but his relentless pursuit of audio perfection laid the groundwork for two giants of the industry. His engineering genius, though paired with business struggles, ultimately seeded a company whose name remains synonymous with powerful, dynamic sound across the globe.