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Henry Edward "Ed" Roberts (September 13, 1941 – April 1, 2010) was an American engineer, entrepreneur and medical doctor who invented the first commercially successful personal computer in 1975.〔 The article gives his date of birth as September 13, 1941.〕 He is most often known as "the father of the personal computer". He founded Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (MITS) in 1970 to sell electronics kits to model rocketry hobbyists, but the first successful product was an electronic calculator kit that was featured on the cover of the November 1971 issue of ''Popular Electronics''. The calculators were very successful and sales topped one million dollars in 1973.〔 A brutal calculator price war left the company deeply in debt by 1974. Roberts then developed the Altair 8800 personal computer that used the new Intel 8080 microprocessor. This was featured on the cover of the January 1975 issue of ''Popular Electronics'', and hobbyists flooded MITS with orders for this $397 computer kit. Bill Gates and Paul Allen joined MITS to develop software and Altair BASIC was Microsoft's first product. Roberts sold MITS in 1977 and retired to Georgia where he farmed, studied medicine and eventually became a small-town doctor living in Cochran, Georgia. ==Early life== Ed Roberts was born on September 13, 1941 in Miami, Florida, to Henry Melvin Roberts, an appliance repairman, and Edna Wilcher Roberts, a homemaker. His younger sister, Cheryl, was born in 1947. During World War II, while his father was in the Army, Roberts and his mother lived on the Wilcher family farm in Wheeler County, Georgia. After the war, the family returned to Miami, but Roberts would spend his summers with his grandparents in rural Georgia. Roberts' father had an appliance repair business in Miami.〔Zannos (2003), 15.〕〔Miller, Samantha; Wescott, Gail Cameron (January 27, 1997). "The Road Not Chosen: He might have been Ed Roberts, billionaire; instead, he became a rural MD". ''People''. pp 97-98〕 Roberts became interested in electronics and built a small relay-based computer while in high school. Although he was intrigued by electronics, medicine was his true passion, and he entered University of Miami with the intention of becoming a doctor, the first in his family to attend college. There he met a neurosurgeon who shared his interest in electronics. The doctor suggested that Roberts get an engineering degree before applying to medical school, and Roberts changed his major to electrical engineering.〔〔Zannos (2003), 16–17.〕 Roberts married Joan Clark while at the university, and when she became pregnant Roberts knew he would have to drop out of school to support his new family. The U.S. Air Force had a program that would pay for college, and in May 1962 he enlisted with the hope of finishing his degree through the Airman Education & Commissioning Program.〔〔Zannos (2003), 18–19.〕 After basic training Roberts attended the Cryptographic Equipment Maintenance School at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. Because of his electrical engineering studies at college, Roberts was made an instructor at the Cryptographic School when he finished the course. To augment his meager enlisted man's pay, Roberts worked on several off-duty projects and even set up a one-man company, Reliance Engineering. The most notable job was to create the electronics that animated the Christmas characters in the window display of Joske's department store in San Antonio. In 1965 he was selected for an Air Force program to complete his college degree and become a commissioned officer. Roberts earned an electrical engineering degree from Oklahoma State University in 1968 and was assigned to the Laser Division of the Weapons Laboratory at Kirtland AFB in Albuquerque, New Mexico.〔〔Mims (1986), 24–27.〕 In 1968, he looked into applying to medical school, but learned that at age 27, he was considered too old.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Ed Roberts (computer engineer)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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