In 1860 – Parisian typesetter and inventor Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville’s uses his Phonoautogram to record sound onto paper but has no way to pay it back.

In 1919 – Presper Eckert was born in Philadelphia. Eckert became famous for his work, with John Mauchly on the ENIAC project.

In 1959 – NASA publicly announced the selection of the United States’ first seven astronauts, who quickly became known as the “Mercury Seven”.

In 1953 – The major studios were inspired by the 1952 3D hit Bwana Devil. Columbia beat Warner Brothers’ House of Wax to the theatre to make Man in the Dark the first 3D motion picture produced and released by a major studio.

In 1959 – The Department of Defense called a meeting at the University of Pennsylvania to define the objectives for a new Common Business Language. Captain Grace Hopper led the group that kicked off COBOL.

1991 – A team moved from Sun Microsystems to work in secret on its “Oak” development project, which was later re-named “Java.”

In 1927 – The Bell System sent live TV images of Herbert Hoover, then the Secretary of Commerce, over telephone lines from Washington, D.C. to an auditorium in Manhattan. It was the first public demonstration in the U.S. of long-distance television transmission.

In 1964 – IBM unveiled the System/360 line of mainframe computers, its most successful computer system. Called the “360” because it was meant to address all possible sizes and types of customer with one unified software-compatible architecture.

In 1969 – The first Request For Comment, RFC 1 put together by Steve Crocker was distributed on the newly operational ARPANET. RFCs describe methods, behaviors, research, or innovations applicable to the working of the Internet.

In 1965 – Hughes Aircraft’s Early Bird launched into orbit. It was the first communications satellite to be placed in synchronous orbit and successfully demonstrated the concept of synchronous satellites for commercial communications.

In 1973 – NASA launched the Pioneer 11 spacecraft, the second mission to investigate Jupiter and the outer solar system and the first to explore the planet Saturn and its main rings.

In 1992 – Microsoft released Windows 3.1. It sold for $149 and added support for sound cards, MIDI, and CD Audio, Super VGA (800 x 600) monitors, and support for 9600 bps modems.