It was unusual that the Timex Sinclair 1000 ended up being my first computer. It was the American version of the Sinclair ZX81, developed by Sinclair Research in the UK and resold by the famous watch manufacturer in the States in 1981. Like the ZX Spectrum, it was compact and affordable, if underpowered and lacking color graphics. The Timex Sinclair 1000 featured a Z80 microprocessor, 2 KB of RAM (expandable to 16 KB), and a flat ‘membrane’ keyboard. It was not a popular computer in the US, although its low price kept it competitive. My mother had found one, not functioning but complete, in the trash at her job- she was a teacher in the embattled Head Start government subsidized preschool program where I was also a student. A school administrator had placed the computer, back in its box with manual and power adapter, in the trash. My mother gave it to me to play with and encouraged me to take it apart and look inside. I remember opening the computer’s plastic case with a screwdriver and finding that by clipping a broken ribbon connector I was able to get the computer functioning again. With the manual I was able to learn some programming in the embedded BASIC programming language. ¹