Steve Wozniak

Stephen Gary Wozniak was born on August 11, 1950, in San Jose, California, the son of Francis "Jerry" Wozniak, a Lockheed engineer. After graduating from Homestead High School in Cupertino (1968) and briefly attending the University of Colorado Boulder, he studied at De Anza College and, from 1971, UC Berkeley. It was in 1971, through mutual friend Bill Fernandez, that Wozniak met the still-teenage Steve Jobs — a meeting that would prove pivotal for both.

The Blue Box Period

That same year, Wozniak read Ron Rosenbaum's October 1971 Esquire article "Secrets of the Little Blue Box," which detailed how underground "phone phreaks" used specific audio tones to manipulate the North American long-distance telephone network and place free calls. Fascinated, Wozniak set out to build his own blue box. He and Jobs tracked down and met John Draper — known in phreaking circles as "Captain Crunch" for the toy whistle (packaged with the cereal) that happened to produce the key 2600 Hz control tone — to compare notes on blue-box construction. Draper's standalone entry in this encyclopedia covers his phreaking career in full; here the connection is narrower: a shared technical circle in which Wozniak, already an accomplished electronics hobbyist, refined his own design.

Wozniak went on to build blue boxes himself while Jobs handled sales; contemporary accounts describe roughly 200 units sold at about $150 each, with profits split between the two. In the phreaking community, Wozniak was known by the handle "Berkeley Blue." One frequently recounted anecdote has Wozniak using a blue box to dial the Vatican and, posing as Henry Kissinger, ask to speak with the Pope — a story that circulates widely in Apple-founding lore but should be treated as an oft-repeated anecdote rather than an independently documented event.

From Phreaking to Apple

Jobs later told his biographer Walter Isaacson that without the blue box, "there wouldn't have been an Apple," crediting the venture as an early proof that the two of them could design, build, and sell a piece of illicit hardware together — a dry run for the partnership that produced the Apple I (completed March 1, 1976) and the company Wozniak, Jobs, and Ronald Wayne founded on April 1, 1976. The phreaking connection did not end there: in 1977, Wozniak brought John Draper on as an independent contractor to build the "Charley Board," a modem-like device letting the Apple II dial into WATS long-distance lines. Apple's management, wary of its call-fraud implications, canceled the project. Wozniak later reflected, "It was an incredible board. But no one at Apple liked Crunch. Only me. They wouldn't let his device become a product."

Wozniak's subsequent career — sole design of the Apple I, principal hardware work on the Apple II, a 1981 plane crash and recovery, departure from daily Apple operations in 1985, and a 1985 National Medal of Technology — belongs to the broader history of Apple Computer rather than to his hacker-culture origins, and is only summarized here.

Timeline

• 1950-08-11Born in San Jose, California.
• 1968Graduates from Homestead High School in Cupertino, California.
• 1971Meets Steve Jobs through mutual friend Bill Fernandez while attending UC Berkeley.
• 1971-10Ron Rosenbaum's Esquire article "Secrets of the Little Blue Box" is published, inspiring Wozniak to build a blue box.
• 1971Wozniak and Jobs meet phreaker John Draper ("Captain Crunch") to compare blue-box building techniques; Wozniak and Jobs go on to build and sell an estimated 200 blue boxes at about $150 each, with Wozniak known in phreaking circles as "Berkeley Blue."
• 1975Joins the Homebrew Computer Club in the Palo Alto area.
• 1976-03-01Completes the design of the Apple I.
• 1976-04-01Co-founds Apple Computer with Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne.
• 1977-04The Apple II, designed primarily by Wozniak, is introduced.
• 1977John Draper works briefly for Apple as a contractor building the "Charley Board"; the project is later canceled by Apple management.
• 1981-02-07Survives a private plane crash, suffering injuries and temporary anterograde amnesia.
• 1985Leaves day-to-day work at Apple; receives the National Medal of Technology alongside Steve Jobs.