Acoustics

I've just delved into the history of acoustic science and technology. Main findings until now:

The first one to systematically and quantitatively investigate acoustics was Wallace Sabine, a late nineteenth century assistant professor of physics at Harvard. He was commissioned to improve the sound of the Sanders lecture theatre, and after three years of fruitless measurements with a 512 Hz organ pipe and of moving cushions around over campus, he finally found the following relation between sound reverberation time t ("echo"), volume of the room or concert hall V, absorption coefficient of the different materials present (including audience and musicians) a(n), and of course their surface s(n):

t=o.164V/Sum(a(n)*s(n))

Sabine first measured the total absorbing power of a room Sum(a(n)*s(n)) in "Sanders Theatre seat cushions". However, later on he decided to change this into the rather more universal unit of "open windows":-)

Hoe het ook zij, it's great that in this essay I can combine physics, history, anthropology, sociology and music.