Jim Marsters
3 08 2009All..
Below is an email from James Marsters’ daughter, Jean Marster. James Marster was one of the three deaf persons who helped push and paved the future for deaf/hoh by inventing TTY way back in 1964.
We all know how TTY revolutionized the world of deaf. Now the telephone access is not limited to hearing persons. We owe a great deal of debt to these three deaf men. Other two deaf men: Harry G. Lang and Robert H. Weitbrecht
Quote:
Dear Friends, With great sadness I write you that my father, James C. Marsters, passed away in he bed on Tuesday. He had not been ill for long, which is the way he would have wanted it.
The day before he died, he spent the afternoon and early evening with Jim Jr., with me and with his granddaughter, Anna. He was full of plans for restaurants he wanted to try, for the next monthly Deaf Lunch Bunch and of how much he’d enjoyed his most recent set of e-mails. He was in no discomfort. That time with him was a precious gift.
He was a wonderful man, and we loved him dearly.
We thank you for your friendship, your e-mails, your visits and your love which helped sustain him over the years.
Please feel free to share this e-mail with anyone who you think would want to know.
There will be a memorial service in Oakland the weekend of October 24-25th.
Yours,
Jean Marsters
Unquote
James C. Marsters, DDS — 4/5/24-7/28/09
Really, the ongoing pursuit for equality; that is, functional equivalence, is a life long battle and slow in getting what deaf/hoh deserves. Telephone access helped break through this seemingly insurmountable barrier. After TTY, relay service with TTY was soon created, and then VRS followed through. Even though I’m considered Father of VRS, I bow my heads to these guys. They made it technology possible. So let us all pause a moment and pay respects.
Folks, if you have stories to share about James Marsters, please feel free to comment. I know many of you elderly folks have had events with him.
eyes open & thumbs up,
Ed
Thanks for this nice tribute to him. Sally and I had the privilege of knowing him well since 1967. The TTY modem was his greatest achievement and initiated the furious and rapid growth of TTYs before the electronic TTYs. At that time, we all loved those “cement mixers”, heavy and awkward as they were, but they truly opened a new world of communications for us, paving the way to relay services which inflated up our already expanded world tenfold. Ed, your contributions to relay services will never be forgotten and you belong right up there with Jim. Kudos to you !
Thanks, Paul. I tried adding picture of Marsters and failed. I asked my guru from Crazy Web to help me out. Hopefully later will see pix of him. Thanks for the compliment…
eyes open & thumbs up…
Ah, yes, Paul…elsewhere they’ve been called Two-Ton Monsters where young children fled in terror cuz of the loud clanking typing ;-] I remember my first one; ugly brute in the living room – grey in color and really a hassle to put in the yellow 12″ wide roll papers into the feed. Even so, I considered it one of the greatest triumph by deaf men. Damn, I thought it was by deaf, not by hearies. That was an important achievement they did.
Jim was known as a man of a GREAT heart. When I was in a high school, he somehow heard of my plans to major in engineering. Even though we never met, he sent me several letters encouraging me to achieve my goals.
He met Bob Weitbrecht after learning that they had a common interest in flying airplanes. While at his home, he observed that Bob was using a TTY with a radio. Jim then got Andrew Saks who was trying to invent a phone for deaf people involved. As a result of these three men’s efforts and financial investments, an international TTY network, including TDI (Telecommunications for the Deaf, Inc.) was created in 1960′s. These three men are considered as the fathers of TTYs.
Paul Taylor came into the TRS arena eventually and is considered as the father of TRS.
Now, we have Ed Bosson as the father of VRS.
Ill miss Jim’s charming charisma!
Sonny
Harry Lang? I thought it would be Andrew Saks… No?
Phil
Phil,
You may be right. I got it from a newspaper article – an old one. I’m not thoroughly familiar so anyone care to comment?
Ed
Thanks a zillions, Ed!
RLM
Phil J is correct. In fact, Harry G. Lang is much younger and wrote a book, “A Phone of Our Own,” published in 2000. Inside the book is a paicture of the trio with Robert Weitbrecht sitting down next to TTY while Andrew Saks and James Marsters were standing watching Robert typing.
I recalled some years ago, I attended some conference where they had exhibits. While browsing the exhibits, a gentelman ssaw me coming and stood up and gave me an hearty handshake as if he knew me. He called me James. I was kind of puzzled and didn’t know that gentelman. I showed him my badge and he realized I was not James but looked like him. Later on, James and I were on TDI Awards committee during TDI Conference in San Deigo, CA. I had the pleasure of working with him.
May he rest in peace.
Ed, thanks for sharing.
CRR
Anyone can see the modem made by Weitbrecht and used by Marsters for his end when both of them made the first tty phone call back in 1964.
Marster’s TTY Modem
Hi,
This is Jim’s daughter, Jean. How cool to see a website talking about the amazing accomplishments of Dr. Robert Weitbrecht, Andrew Saks and my dad. They were an amazing and talented team.
Within a day or two NTID will post an obituary for my dad, so stay tuned. The AG Bell Assoc. is also working on two pieces.
For those interested, my father’s memorial service will be in Oakland on the weekend of October 24-25th.
In lieu of flowers, we ask that donations be made in his honor to either the John Tracy Clinic,806 West Adams Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90007 or to the Rose Weingarten Peninsula Oral School, 3518 Jefferson Ave., Redwood City, CA 94062.
Condolence cards for the family should be mailed to:
Marsters Family
PO Box 3654
Oakland,CA 94609
I recalled Jim’s love of railroad train as a train fan like me. Loved to help our hearing-impaired community. Thanked him and his two associates as a great hard -of-hearng team together who developed the first designed wooden cradle box and also the first coupler (modem device) modified for Baudet and which permitted teletypewriters to connect to standard telephone line in 1964. Thanked the three wonderful talented team of James C. Marstsers, DDS (4/28/2009), Robert Haig Weitbrecht (1920 – 1983) and Andrew Saks (1917 – 1989) for their hard work to establish the first communication over the telephone system in our deaf – hearing world successfully. He was one of several first TTY MUSEUM volunteers in Los Angeles Country Fair September 1994 enjoyably and fun, too.
Harry C. Gibbens, Sr. (TTY MUSEUM curator)
Many years back, I recalled having couple luncheons with Dr Marsters as we talked about how tty modems came into being. We talked about the Baudot speed, whether it should be higher than 45 Baudot by going ACSII or stay at the current level. Even talked about his company APCOM’s competition in later years on tty modems with Phone TTY of NJ by I. Lee Brody.
My dad introduced me to Dr Marsters when I was young and he was a practicing orthodontist.
Do get the book, “A Phone of Our Own” written by Harry Lang as it has more information about early tty development.
[...] CLICK HERE in regarding to his daughter’s email [...]
FYI, there is a lovely obit on my father on the “NTID News” website. The LA Times may also publish one in the next few days.
Ed,
There’s a lovely article on my dad that just came out on the DTI’s eNotes dated August 10th. They run a wonderful photo of the 3 , Weitbrecht, Marsters and Saks. If you have an e-mail I could forward it to you to be posted.
The AG Bell Assoc also put up a short piece on it’s website today. They plan on doing a longer article in their magazine.
The link to the LA Times obituary that came out today:
http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-james-marsters15-2009aug15,0,6865338.story
Jean M.
I grew up wanting to learn to fly but thinking deaf people could not fly because they could not use the radio . . . until sometime in the early 1980s I met Jim Marsters at an AG Bell convention. Somehow he mentioned his Piper Tri-Pacer in our conversation, and I was thunderstruck. “How can deaf people become pilots?” I asked incredulously. Jim took the time to explain how, and although some years had to pass before I could afford to learn to fly, my dream came true in the mid-’90s. He is one of my all-time heroes.
Funny thing, though: today’s New York Times obituary starts with the words “Sign language.” I was not aware Jim signed. Did he? Or was it a reporter’s ignorant stereotyping?
Henry,
Let’s see what folks say about that. I was told he does not know all sign language, but knew a few signs.
eyes open & thumbs up…
Smart pick-up there! I can’t speak for the reporter. My dad wasn’t fluent in ASL by any means, but he tried hard! And sign language certainly didn’t help him get by college, dental school or practice orthodontics. You might contact the NY Times for a correction if you want.
On a broader note, isn’t it great that the Wall Street Journal and the NY Times picked up the story and ran news obituaries on him in the last week? The recognition really goes to the 3 pioneers, Weitbrecht, Saks and Marsters. I’m just glad that their story is now told in the hearing press. The US has also come a long way in that the hearing press values this history enough to print it.
Jean
FYI, the NY Times, the Wall Street Journal and now the Washington Post have all run news obits on my dad.
Henry,
I contacted the NY Times and asked for a correction. I’m not sure if they’ll do one.
Also for the record, I just got an e-mail about how my dad met Robert “Bob” Weitbrecht. This is the straight story from Patsy McKeown( deaf):
In 1963, my husband and two children hiked up the Mt. Lassen trail to the top to observe the dead volcano. It was where Ed(hearing) heard Bob’s “deaf” voice who was explaining the history of the volcano to a young boy so Ed introduced himself, chatted for a while. I was down below at our campsite in the parking lot with a one-year old baby and Ed told me about meeting a deaf man above. In a couple of months, we had a dinner party and invited Bob Weitbrecht, Arthur Simon, Mr. and Mrs. Compton, parents of Stephen. When Arthur learned of Bob’s interest in radio and how he “listens” to it via morse code, he knew right away that Jim Marsters should meet him. The rest is history.
Jean send me this article by New York Times… good information there.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/23/us/23marsters.html?_r=3&hpw
eyes open & thumbs up…