Also, up an Apple keyboard signed by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak obtained in-person by tech venture capitalist Steve Jurvetson. Other items include computers from the collection of software pioneer Roger Wagner, materials from the collection of Apple’s first COO Del Yocam, and a rare musical cue sheet from Pixar’s Monsters, Inc., signed by Steve Jobs, Randy Newman, and others.
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Apple-Produced 1978 Star Trek Game Cassette
Original Apple-produced Star Wars/Star Trek cassette tape game released in 1978 for the Apple II, featuring the unlicensed software. This was the first Star Wars game ever released, casting the player as a ‘space pilot trainee’ who destroys TIE fighters using a first-person heads-up display. The original Star Wars movie had been released only a year earlier, and Apple hoped to capitalize on the Skywalker-mania that gripped the nation. The inclusion of the Star Trek game made this cassette a grand unification of sci-fi fandom.
Includes an image of Apple employee #8, Chris Espinosa, holding this exact tape. Now known as Apple’s longest-serving employee, Espinosa joined Apple in 1976, at age 14, when it was still housed in Steve Jobs’ parents’ garage, writing software manuals and coding in BASIC after school. He remembers manually copying the Star Wars cassettes, using a rig that fed eight recording tape drives from one master. He would copy eight tapes at a time as orders came in; even today, he can recognize any of the Apple cassette software by listening to the data played over a conventional stereo.
Apple-1 with original box, signed by Steve Wozniak up for auction
An Apple-1 computer with its exceedingly rare original box, signed by designer Steve Wozniak will be auctioned by Boston-based RR Auction.
The Apple-1 was originally conceived by Steve Jobs and Steve ‘Woz’ Wozniak as a bare circuit board to be sold as a kit and completed by electronics hobbyists, their initial market being Palo Alto’s Homebrew Computer Club. Wozniak alone designed the hardware, circuit board designs, and operating system for the computer, and he first demonstrated the Apple-1 at a club meeting in July 1976. Upon seeing interest among the membership, he and Jobs pooled their resources to have the boards produced.
They originally hoped to sell 50 of them at $40 per board to recover their initial $1000 outlay. However, seeking a larger audience, Jobs approached Paul Terrell, owner of The Byte Shop in Mountain View, California, one of the first personal computer stores in the world. Terrell offered to buy 50 of the computers—at a wholesale price of $500 apiece, to retail at $666.66—but only if they came fully assembled. With this request, Terrell aimed to elevate the computer from the domain of the hobbyist/enthusiast to the realm of the mainstream consumer. Jobs agreed to Terrell’s deal and managed to secure favorable terms for financing the parts necessary to build 50 Apple-1 computers.
The Apple-1 computer was restored to its original, operational state in September 2020 by Apple-1 expert Corey Cohen. A comprehensive, technical condition report prepared by Cohen is available to qualified bidders; he evaluates the current condition of the unit as 8.0/10. Aside from the presence of the exceptionally rare original shipping box—one of just a handful of known Apple-1 board and box sets known today—the most remarkable aspect of this Apple-1 computer is that it is documented to be fully operational: the system was operated without fault for approximately eight hours in a comprehensive test.
Accompanying documentation includes the original Apple-1 Operation Manual and original Apple Cassette Interface manual, which feature the original “Apple Computer Co.” logo, designed by third Apple co-founder Ron Wayne, on the covers. The Operation Manual features information on getting the system running, using the system monitor, and expanding the Apple system, and has a fold-out schematic of the Apple-1 computer. At the center is a page headed “6502 Hex Monitor Listing”—a famous program commonly known as the ‘Woz Monitor.’
Also includes a program from the 2005 UCLA event at which Wozniak signed the box, an image of the present owner with Wozniak and the box at the event, and a printout of a 1994 email from Woz about the Apple-1.
