I saw the Apple //c at a local computer store (remember those…). It was down the strip mall from the Food World where my mom shopped. I went shopping with my mom partly so I could goto the computer store. I got the promo materials for the //c and took them home.
Apple //c – Image from Wikipedia
My Apple //c was like this one with the green monochrome monitor, but I didn’t have an external floppy drive.
We really got into this machine. My dad eventually bought the Apple Scribe Color Thermal printer. It was color way back then. The thermal design had some major pluses and minuses, but I was so happy I could print color. I also bought MousePaint and the Apple II Mouse.
Apple Scribe Printer – Image from Wikipedia
Apple II Mouse – Image from Wikipedia
I got into computer art drawing with a program called Dazzle Draw by Broderbund Software. I drew all kinds of things like band logos, landscapes, and a nuclear power plant including the cooling towers. I had so much fun drawing using the Apple II mouse and Dazzle Draw. I liked it much better than MousePaint, which came with the Mouse. There weren’t a lot of applications that made full use of the mouse which is understandable since it was an accessory that not all owners bought. I was interested because I saw the mouse with the Apple IIGS, which I wanted but my dad put the brakes on that one…
Dazzle Draw
I began my lifelong hobby of computer games on this machine. Everything from a text based Tuesday Night Football to great games like Super Bunny (my mom liked this one…). I also became a member of the local Apple II Users group and ended up becoming the Gaming SIG leader. I had monthly meetings ar my house to look at the latest games and do reviews. After the meeting concluded, we did a bit of creative backups of some of the games. We had to make sure it was outside of the official meeting for obvious reasons. I really enjoyed interacting with the other members of the user group and the Games SIG in particular.
That wasn’t just all fun and games, I used this computer throughout high school to write all of my papers and print on my Apple Scribe printer. It would print graphics in B/W, of course. I got the Broderbund Science Toolkit software for Christmas which has scientific instruments that interfaced with the Apple //c and allowed me to do experiments. That was very cool and I haven’t used anything like it since. I used AppleWorks for all of my papers. I tried to learn ApplePascal. I really wanted to like GeoFile Database (GEOS). I liked GEOS but I never got my head wrapped around how GeoFILE worked. I used the AppleWorks Database for so many things like a cassette tape catalog, etc that I really wanted a database with a GUI to utilize my mouse, and GEOS was awesome as an OS but geoFile just …. If I knew then what I know now, would have been much easier to use.
This is GEOS for the Apple II.
I eventually began wanting a PC when I used my friend’s Tandy PC with Windows 3.1. I thought that was so cool. I actually was aware of the Macintosh and Apple IIGS but more money than I know my dad would spend. I commenced to convincing him that we needed a PC with Windows 3.1.