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This week in 1882 – Thomas Edison’s first commercial hydroelectric power plant began operation on the Fox River in Appleton, Wisconsin.
In 1908 – The first production of the Ford Model T automobile was built at the Piquette Plant in Detroit, Michigan. Ford puts the Model T car on the market at a price of US$825.
This week in 1951 – CBS made the first color televisions available for sale to the general public. However, the system was bulky, flickered, and was not compatible with earlier black and white sets. CBS’s TV sets and the system used to get the color broadcasts to them eventually failed.
In 1968 – The Boeing 747 was rolled out and shown to the public for the first time at the Boeing Everett Factory.
In 1982 this week – Sony launched the first consumer compact disc player, model number CDP-101. It was available at a list price of about $730.
And this week in 1996 – The Nintendo 64 video game system, known as the first ‘true’ 64-bit system, hit North American shelves. That first day, Nintendo sold 500,000 systems, with the Mario64 game selling the same with it. Needless to say, Nintendo’s system was a big success.