Thomas Greenway Stockham, (December 22, 1933-January 6, 2004) was an American scientist who developed the first practical digital audio recording system, and pioneered techniques for digital audio recording and processing as well. December 22 is the 356th day of the year (357th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 1933 was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... January 6 is the 6th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. ... 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Digital audio describes sound recording and reproduction systems which work by using a digital representation of the audio waveform. ...

Stockham is known as the father of digital audio. He earned an Sc.D. degree from MIT in 1959 and was appointed Assistant Professor of Electrical Engineering. While at MIT, he noticed several of the students there using a MIT Lincoln Laboratory TX-0 mainframe computer installed at the campus to record themselves digitally into the computer's memory, using a microphone and a loudspeaker connected to a A/D-D/A converter attached to the TX-0. This led Stockham to doing his own digital audio experiments on this same computer in 1962. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or MIT, is a research and educational institution located in the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. MIT is a world leader in science and technology, as well as in many other fields, including management, economics, linguistics, political science, and philosophy. ... MIT Lincoln Laboratory, also known as Lincoln Lab, is a federally funded research and development center managed by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and funded by the United States Department of Defense. ... The TX-0, for Transistorized Experimental computer zero but affectionately referred to as the tixo, was the first fully transistorized computer to enter service and contained a then-huge 64K of 18-bit words of core memory. ... This article or section should include material from AD converters In electronics, an analog-to-digital converter (abbreviated ADC, A/D, or A to D) is a device that converts continuous signals to discrete digital numbers. ... In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter (DAC or D-to-A) is a device for converting a digital (usually binary) code to an analogue signal (current, voltage or charges). ... 1962 was a common year starting on Monday (link will take you to calendar). ...

In 1968 he left MIT for the University of Utah, and in 1975 founded Soundstream, Inc. with Malcolm Low. They developed a 16-bit digital audio recording system using a 16-track Honeywell instrumentation tape recorder as a transport, connected to digital audio recording & playback hardware of Stockham's design. It ran at a sampling rate of 50 KHz, as opposed to the audio CD sampling rate of 44.1 kHz, and Digital Audio Tape's (DAT) rate of 48 kHz. Soundstream was a company established in 1975 in Salt Lake City, Utah, by Dr. Thomas Stockham, Malcolm Low, Jules Bloomenthal, and Robert Ingebretsen. ... Honeywell (NYSE: HON) is a major American multinational corporation that produces electronic control systems and automation equipment. ... The sampling frequency or sampling rate defines the number of samples per second taken from a continuous signal to make a discrete signal. ... CD re-directs here; see Cd for other meanings of CD. Image of a compact disc (pencil included for scale) A compact disc (or CD) is an optical disc used to store digital data, originally developed for storing digital audio. ... A 90-minute DAT cartridge, size compared to an AAA(LR03) battery. ...

Soundstream Inc. was the first commercial digital recording company in the United States, located in downtown Salt Lake City. Stockham was the first to make a commercial digital recording, using his own Soundstream recorder in 1976 at the Santa Fe Opera. In 1980, Soundstream merged with the Digital Recording Company (DRC) and became DRC/Soundstream.

Dr Stockham played a key role in the digital restoration of Enrico Caruso recordings, described in a 1975 IEEE paper "Blind Deconvolution Through Digital Signal Processing." These recordings were the first ever to be digitally restored by computer, and were released on the album "Caruso-A Legendary Performer" by RCA Records in 1976. Enrico Caruso - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia /**/ @import /skins-1. ... The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers or IEEE (pronounced as eye-triple-ee) is an international non-profit, professional organization incorporated in the State of New York, United States. ... Caruso-A Legendary Performer is an album by the Italian tenor Enrico Caruso. ... RCA, formerly an initialism for the Radio Corporation of America, is now a trademark used by two companies for products descended from that common ancestor: Thomson SA, which manufactures consumer electronics like RCA-branded televisions, DVD players, video cassette recorders, direct broadcast satellite decoders, camcorders, audio equipment, telephones, and related...

In 1974 he investigated President Richard Nixon's White House tape.

Dr. Stockham's developments and contributions to digital audio paved the way for later digital audio technologies, such as the audio compact disc and DAT (Digital Audio Tape). Interference colors. ... A 90-minute DAT cartridge, size compared to an AAA(LR03) battery. ...

Dr Stockham received wide recognition for his pioneering contributions to digital audio. He received among many others, the Gold Medal from the Audio Engineering Society, a Technical Emmy in 1988, the NARAS awarded him a Grammy in 1994 , and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences awarded him (and Robert B. Ingebretsen, his associate in the development of the Soundstream recorders) a Scientific and Engineering Award in 1999. Established in 1948, the Audio Engineering Society (AES) draws its membership from amongst engineers, scientists, manufacturers and other organisations and individuals with an interest or involvement in the professional audio industry. ... A Technology and Engineering Emmy Award is given by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) for outstanding achievement in technical or engineering development. ... Grammy Award statuette The Grammy Awards, presented by the Recording Academy (an association of Americans professionally involved in the recorded music industry) for outstanding achievements in the recording industry, is one of four major music awards shows held annually in the United States (the Billboard Music Awards, the American Music... Founded on May 11, 1927 in California, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures. ...

External links

• Tom Stockham and Digital Audio Recording
• Commentary on Thomas Stockham
• IEEE's Virtual Museum page on Thomas Stockham
• Article on the death of Dr. Thomas Stockham (free registration required)