Apple Computer Check Signed by Steve Jobs Expected to Fetch More Than $25,000 at Auction

[laptech]

This Steve Jobs autograph site https://www.thememorabiliaclub.com/...uthentic-steve-jobs-autographs-and-signatures

shows 2 Apple computer cheques signed by Jobs. If you look at the first chegue it is dated 23 July 1976, the same date on the cheque as the one being auctioned off but notice that that cheque is not hand written and look at the cheque sequence number. The one in the site show is being 198 and the one being auctioned off is 195. So on that day, 23rd July 1976, purely based on the cheque numbers, Steve Jobs went into a Radio Shack store bought something for the tune of $4.01 then used a further 2 more cheques before getting to cheque 198 which we can see has been typed on instead of hand written. So what ever he bought it must have been for the Apple I Woz was building. Jobs then goes and uses a type machine to type up a company cheque which is cheque number 198 as seen in the website.

 

[bousozoku]

Get a receipt?

Many POS systems were experimenting with thermal paper. If you left the receipt somewhere moderately warm, such as sunny California, you receipt might look like a black strip of paper.

 

[Attirex]

One of my first computer experiences was with TRS-80s in middle school (every kid got an accompanying comic book depicting two plucky, headset-wearing teen-agers assisting a temporarily disabled Superman with the help of....TRS-80s!), and that was ca. 1982. So...yeah. Also, I'm old. And get off my lawn, and take that damned VR headset with you.

 

[boss.king]

Many POS systems were experimenting with thermal paper. If you left the receipt somewhere moderately warm, such as sunny California, you receipt might look like a black strip of paper.

A receipt doesn’t have to be printed on thermal paper.

 

[msackey]

Why is he using a small j for Jobs?.... I love the guy.... but that's just weird.....

That's not weird.

You'll need to look up other people who have done that including "bell hooks".

There are typographical reasons to use lowercase -- e.g., integrated better as a whole, it stands out. And we know Jobs was very keen on typographic design.

 

[bousozoku]

A receipt doesn’t have to be printed on thermal paper.

No, it wouldn't have to be, but they were experimenting with the technology at the time.

 

[bousozoku]

Yeah, this is an appalling lack of historical accuracy. I don't know where the author got that quote but it's terrible, and the article should be amended.

There were, as you later mentioned, a whole bunch of options around at the time, mostly S100-based machines like the North Star Horizon, the IMSAI, the Cromemco, the Sol-20, and the original S-100 box, the Altair. There were also many kits around like the KIM-1 though I don't remember those all that well.

Kim, Sym, and AIM were the 6502 systems I remember. Ohio Scientific had a huge Zilog Z-80/Intel 8080 machine.

I learned to program BASIC on an Altair 8800, with an Intel 8008 and 6 dumb terminals. It took seven minutes and an 8 inch diskette swap to boot that machine.

 

[Jasonstevens]

I know nothing about cheques, is it normal for someone to have kept a cashed cheque long enough to realise the person who wrote it was going to be a notable figure years later?

 

[FreakinEurekan]

Many POS systems were experimenting with thermal paper. If you left the receipt somewhere moderately warm, such as sunny California, you receipt might look like a black strip of paper.

Not at Radio Shack 🤣 back then, receipts were hand-written on a sales ticket there. POS didn’t come to the Shack until the late 1980s.

 

[FreakinEurekan]

I know nothing about cheques, is it normal for someone to have kept a cashed cheque long enough to realise the person who wrote it was going to be a notable figure years later?

After being processed through the payee’s bank, back then the checks (cheques) were returned to the issuer, I.e. Apple. Someone there likely realized the value potential within the few years before they’d have been disposed of.

 

[bousozoku]

Not at Radio Shack 🤣 back then, receipts were hand-written on a sales ticket there. POS didn’t come to the Shack until the late 1980s.

Apparently, not where you were, anyway. Those I visited used them.

 

[Musocat]

I used to call Radio Shack "The Adapter Store." Whatever I needed to connect, they seemed to have an adapter for it. For everything else electronic I went to Ametron in Hollywood.