In 1675 – Gottfreid Leibniz wrote the integral sign in an unpublished manuscript, a sign that would later haunt the nightmares of students and be widely misapplied on blackboards in movies. So happy Integral Day!

In 1969 – The first ever computer to computer link was established on the ARPANET. UCLA student Charley Kline sent the characters l and o to Stanford the connection crashed before he could finish sending ‘login’ The Internet has been crashy right from the start.

In 1998 – The Space Shuttle Discovery blasted off on STS-95 with 77-year old John Glenn on board, making him the oldest person to go into space.

In 2012 – Apple announced Scott Forstall would leave the company in one year, and that retail head John Browett had left the company as well.

Like Tech History? Purchase Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.

In 1793 – Eli Whitney applied to patent his improved cotton gin, capable of cleaning 50 pounds of lint per day, and powering patent metaphors and arguments for centuries to come.

In 1955 – A pair of proud Seattle parents welcomed their new son into the world, having no idea he would become one of the most loved and hated man of all time. Happy birthday William Henry Gates the third. You know him as Bill.

In 1998 – A different Bill, President Bill Clinton signed into law the Digital Millenium Copyright Act, making it illegal for you to use computers the way they were designed to be used, if big companies didn’t want you to.

Like Tech History? Purchase Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.

In 1904 – The first underground New York City subway line opened. The line ran from City Hall in lower Manhattan through Grand Central, Times Square and ended north in Harlem. Rides cost five cents.

In 1994 – HotWired (later to become Wired.com) launched bringing with it the first large quantity sales of banner ads. AT&T, Zima, MCI, Volvo, Club Med and 1-800-COLLECT all plunked down for the privilege.

In 2005 – The European Space Agency launched its first satellite, a micro-satellite called the SSETI Express Satellite, designed and built by European students.

Like Tech History? Purchase Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.

In 1936 – The first electric generator went into full operation at Hoover Dam. About a month after President Roosevelt had dedicated the dam and tried to encourage people to call it the Boulder Dam.

In 1992 – Software deployment issues in CAD, the new ambulance dispatch system in London caused 30-45 deaths. Poor training, a memory leak and no load testing contributed to the failure.

In 2004 – Apple debuted the iPod photo, capable of displaying digital photographs and album art on a built-in color screen.

In 2012 – Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system went on sale, with its tile-based start screen.

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In 1955 Tappan introduced the first microwave oven for home use. It sold for $1,295. Raytheon developed the Radarrange after engineer Percy LeBaron Spencer was working on an active radar set and accidentally melted a candy bar in his pocket.

In 1977 – VAX/VMS was born. At a shareholder meeting, DEC the Digital Equipment Corporation released VMS v1.0 the first version of what we later be called OpenVMS, along with the VAX 11/780 architecture which increased the PDP-11 address space.

In 2001 – Microsoft Windows XP hit retail shelves for the first time.

Like Tech History? Purchase Tom Merritt’s Chronology of Tech History at Merritt’s Books site.