MINNEAPOLIS — This week marked 40 years since Apple launched the first Mac. The revolutionary computer helped pave the way for the iPod and iPhone, and for Apple to become the world’s biggest and most valuable company.
It’s hard to think of a computer without a mouse, but a pointing device for a screen was one of the innovations of the first Macintosh.
40 years ago, Fred Falk took his son Jeremy to buy the first Mac in Minneapolis.
“We purchased an Apple at a computer store in uptown,” said Fred Falk.
The starting price in 1984 – $2,495, or about 7 grand adjusted for inflation.
“It felt like it was expensive. But it felt important to be there at that time, as technology,” said Fred. “It was taking off.”
“From the moment I was introduced to this, these products that Apple was making, I was immediately enamored and totally engaged,” said Jeremy Falk, owner of the original Mac.
Jeremy now lives in California, where he’s known as the “MacMan,” helping to fix apple computers of all shapes, sizes and ages. His original Mac still operational on his shelf.
“I look at it and it seems to have such care involved and such design thought and such engineering and it and it really continues to blow me away,” said Jeremy.
As the company prepares to introduce its cutting-edge Vision Pro headset to the masses next week, Fred and Jeremy are looking forward to the next 40 years.
“The vision that Apple and the technology that is evolving, is going to take us to a place that is hard to imagine.”
“I am grateful for this company and what they’ve brought to the world and how it’s helped to seemingly connect us in a positive way and giving me a purpose and a long career that is not over.”
The Vision Pro headset will be released Friday. It’s starting price – more expensive than the original Mac – at $3,500.
