Calitone TV Attachment The Calitone TV Attachment was manufactured for The M. Calig Company of Los Angeles, CA under their trade name of "Calitone" in 1964. This assistive listening device let a hard of hearing person listen to a TV via an ear bud (receiver) clipped across the TV's loudspeaker. This device consisted of a receiver attached to 19½' of wire that terminated in two alligator clips that clipped to the output side of the TV's loudspeaker transformer.
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| The Calitone TV Attachment is here shown in its original packaging. It had not been opened or used from 1964 (the invoice date) until opened to be photographed for the Museum in 2014, a period of 50 years. Click here to read a letter by the president of Acousticon Hearing Aids, Inc. on the use of the Calitone TV Attachment. Click here for instructions on how to hook up the Calitone TV Attachment to a TV (pdf). |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| Front view of the receiver of the Calitone TV Attachment. On the face of the receiver are stamped "Calitone" (upper right), "Japan" (bottom) and "Model T" (upper left) . Below the receiver are two screws—called "sound tips"—a silver one (left) and a gold one (right). |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| The two sound tips have different sized holes in them. The silver one has a larger hole and the gold one a smaller hole. Click here for instructions on how to use the silver and gold sound tips to adjust the tone (pdf). |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| The Calitone TV Attachment receiver shown here with the gold sound tip screwed into it. The smaller hole of the gold tip made low-pitched tones more audible. In contrast, the larger hole on the silver sound tip made medium-pitched tone more audible. Without either sound tip screwed in, the large hole (seen in the picture above) allowed high, medium and low-pitched tones to be heard equally. |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| Front view of the Calitone TV Attachment ear hook and receiver (shown separated). |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| Front view of the Calitone TV Attachment receiver with the ear hook pressed onto the nubbin of the receiver. Worn this way, the receiver hung loosely at the mouth of the ear canal. |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| Rear view of the Calitone TV Attachment receiver shown attached to the plastic ear hook. A person could wear the Calitone TV Attachment one of two ways—as an ear hook or as an ear bud (shown below). |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| If you wanted to wear the Calitone TV Attachment as an ear bud, instead of pressing the ear hook onto the nubbin, you pressed the ear tip onto the nubbin (here shown separated). |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| The Calitone TV Attachment ear bud with the ear tip attached. |  | Click picture for larger view | | | |
| Invoice for the Calitone TV Attachment dated December 17, 1964. The Calitone TV Attachment cost $2.00, $0.08 sales tax, $0.24 postage and $0.49 handling charge for at total of $2.81. Click here to read this invoice as a full-size pdf document.
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