We’re looking back at the first US weather satellite, the birth of a tech giant and the launch of one of the most popular e-mail services… It all happened This Week in Tech History.
This week in 1797 – Nathaniel Briggs of New Hampshire patented an early form of washing machine for clothes, called the “box mangler.” It had a heavy frame containing a large box filled with rocks, on a series of wooden rollers. Two people were required, to move the box back and forth in order to clean the clothes.
1960 – The first U.S. weather satellite was launched. “TIROS I” was put into orbit. The TIROS-1 satellite transmitted the first television picture from space and meteorologists saw the first pictures of a midlatitude cyclone over the northeastern United States.
1976 – Apple Computer was founded by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne — in a garage in Cupertino, CA. Just two weeks later, Ronald Wayne sold his 10% stake in Apple for $800. That stake today, would be worth 75.5 Billion dollars.
1981 – The Osborne 1, the first successful portable computer, is unveiled at the West Coast Computer Faire in San Francisco.
2004 – Google announced a new service to the public. A project that up until then was known by the code name, Caribou. The project’s real name was Gmail, and it quickly became one of the most popular e-mail services around.
And this week in 2010 – Apple Inc. released the first generation iPad, which quickly became to most popular tablet computer.