Tech History Made on January 30, 1925

On this day in 1925 Douglas Carl Engelbart was born in Oregon. Engelbart was a pioneer and ahead of his time. He studied electrical engineering, served in the Navy as a radar technician, worked for NACA (what became NASA), then went back to electrical engineering at UC Berkeley. In the mid 60's , Engelbart had his own research lab. It was here he developed the first screen selection device, or "mouse" (pictured above.) His lab also developed the first operating system and teleconferencing in the 1960's but all this was a little too early for its time.

He never received any royalties for his inventions or ideas. Engelbart went through a rough patch in the late 80's. His lab closed, his house burned down and he fought lymphoma. Today Logitech has honored Engelbart by giving him free office space. I guess this doesn't exactly fix all he's gone through but it's still a nice gesture.