Apple II Bits

When I left my position as an editor at Computerworld two years ago, I suggested that their Apple II coverage would be no more. That was an exaggeration, of course — while I did contribute offbeat articles interviewing KansasFest attendees and reviewing Apple biopics, the day-to-day coverage of mainstream events in the retrocomputing world were Gregg Keizer‘s bailiwick, with frequent reports of Apple history hitting the auction block.

And so it’s Keizer who put the Apple-1 back on the Computerworld.com homepage last month with news that Apple co-founder and Adventures of an Apple Founder author Ron Wayne‘s historical documents are up for sale. "It includes original working proofs of the Apple-1 manual, Wayne’s original company logo — perhaps the oldest in existence," reports Keizer, "and design renderings of a proposed Apple II case." A phone interview with Steve Wozniak adds some perspective on the widespread interest in Apple’s early history.

Wayne’s lot is listed at Christie’s and is estimated to sell for $30,000 – $50,000 USD. If you want a closer look at the goods in advance of the December 11 auction, Engadget posted over five dozen images of Wayne’s library three years ago.

Image courtesy Engadget

I’m hopeful Wayne, the perennial down-on-his-luck example of a missed opportunity, will see some profit from this sale. It’s a wonder neither of the Apple co-founders shared their fortunes with their former partner — whether because he warrants or deserves it (would Apple exist without him?), or just out of pity.

UPDATE (13-Dec-14): Ron Wayne’s lot sold for $25,000.

(Hat tip to Darrell Etherington and Robert McMillan)

Chris Espinosa is Apple Inc.’s longest-running employee; his career as Apple employee #8 hit the 35-year mark on March 17th. He’s conducted a number of interviews over the years, such as this one in 2011, but he was being noted as an Apple underdog as far back as 2000, when he spoke with Alex Pang. The interview runs just over 8,000 words, including one section dedicated solely to the Apple II manual:

I was working for Jef Raskin, who with Brian Howard wrote the original Integer BASIC manual, when I went off to Berkeley in 1978. When I left, Jef gave me a task. He wanted to keep me on staff, but knew that I wasn’t going to be able to work the hours that I had been previously. So he gave me a long-term task: he gave me what Mike Scott had assembled as the mini-manual for the Apple II, which was basically the product of a series of nightly forays into people’s desk drawers for anything typed — or handwritten, in a few cases — that smacked of technical material, that he periodically sent with Sherry Livingston down to the Quick Print place to print, collate and assemble, and put into binder covers with clear plastic and wraparound spine and three-hole punch.

That was what was dropped in with every Apple II. That was the mini-manual. That was Apple’s documentation. None of it was written consciously for an audience, and Jef said, "We need a technical manual for the Apple II." Actually, there was the mini-manual, and there was the "red book," which was essentially the same material in a red binding. Jef gave me a copy of the red book and said, "I want you to write a real manual out of this."

You can download a copy of the Red Book (not to be confused with the even rarer Blue Book) from the Apple II History site.

(Hat tip to Steve Weyhrich)