On August 12, 1981, IBM announced its new Personal Computer. Not sure if I have one of those original ones down stairs or not, but do know that I have a PC Junior they came out with a little later.
The story I had heard when I was working at IBM was that some of the Powers To Be got a group of about a dozen innovative thinkers and put them in a room down in Boca Raton Florida and told them to come up with a personal computer. They were encouraged to think outside the box and I remember being told they did. They did it within a year of annoucement. Actually none of the parts I was told were built by IBM, they were all purchased.
Those first personal computers with the floppy disk were actually far more confusing to me than today's cell phone and finally about 1983, I did learn how to use one. It was mainly a spread sheet Visi Calc Program that I used. I was just flabbergasted with all the fantastic things I could do with that spread sheet program.
That was the start of today's personal computers. Can you imagine how different your day would be without them??
Now the above facts are not all correct on how IBM came up with its Personal Computer, but for word and rumor spread to us in the trenches, actually pretty accurate. If you have an interest and want to read some of the old archived press releases and history, you can click on the following links:
How it all came about:
http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/pc25/pc25_birth.html (http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/pc25/pc25_birth.html)
The actual press release on August 12, 1981:
http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/pc25/pc25_press.html (http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/pc25/pc25_press.html)