The Original Mac Factory Won’t Be Getting Museum Treatment

By

macfactory

After the death of Steve Jobs last year the city of Fremont wanted to celebrate Jobs’s work by registering his original Macintosh factory as a place of historical significance. Fremont’s city council quickly went to work on getting the Mac factory – which was a state-of-the-art automation facility at the time – registered, but found out that the building isn’t old enough to meet federal criteria for a historic designation.

According to federal criteria, a building must be at least 50 years old to be registered as a historic place of significance, and Apple’s Mac factory is only 30 years old. Fremont City Council spent $45,000 in the effort to get the factory listed before realizing they wouldn’t be able to do so.

At the time of it’s opening, the Mac factory featured automated production lines that were highly advanced for the time period. Apple only used the factory to make Macs for its first two years of existence, but continued to produce laser printers and other products at the factory until it was shut down in 1992.

Fremont hoped that the historical designation on the Mac Factory would promote their heritage and significance in Silicon Valley. Now that their plans to have it registered as a historical place of significance have been dashed, the city council plans to have a plaque placed on the building to honor its significance.

Here’s a promotional video Apple made about the factory, using it as promotional tool to recruit new talent.


 

Source: Mercury News

Via: MacObserver

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