Audio Books: An Amazing Story

By Helen Wall

It all began with the Royal National Institute for the Blind, which is located in England. During the 1920s the institute was conducting quite a bit of research on how they could create audio books for the blind. While they were doing this research, there was a huge need for help for World War 1 soldiers who had become blind during the war.

It did not take the Royal National Institute for the Blind very long to develop audio books that could be played on the record players used during that period in 1926.

The very first two audio books for the blind marked the history of listening to stories: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie and Typhoon by Joseph Conrad.

In that time, audio books usually came with a package of approximately ten records, because one record could hold a mere twenty five minutes of audio.

An unfortunate event took place in 1940 when the Royal National Institute for the Blind was destroyed by a bomb, as well as the replacement. Important materials that were needed in order to create audio books for the blind were also destroyed during the bombings.

That is when the American Foundation of the Blind began creating audio books, and sent the materials the National Royal Institute for the Blind needed to begin creating them again. In a strange occurrence, the shipment of those materials was destroyed at the London Harbor during a bombing raid. Things did not look so good for the RNIB in England. Fortunately, the second shipment of the materials from the American Foundation of the Blind made it, and the RNIB starting making audio books again.

Cassette audio books did not hit the market until the 1960s, which were known as 4 tracks. They required a special delivery system because they were large. Fortunately, regular delivery was revived when the compact cassette was invented and audio books became available on CDs.

The audio book has seen quite a history! Audio books are more popular than ever with anyone who enjoys them, and can be listened to on CD players, MP3 players and more.

The best part about an audio book is that you can be cleaning your home, driving your vehicle, or doing other tasks while listening to a book. That is something you just cannot do with a paperback. You can listen to a great story, learn another language, listen to a seminar, and even more with audio books.

Copyright: Helen Wall

Helen Wall is the author of this article. Visit http://www.audiobooksbonanza.com/ to download audio books from an extensive range of titles from top publishers. Join the free newsletter now and get to know about the latest hot off the press titles, receive time limited special offers and discounts, before anyone else.