Before co-founding Apple Computer Company in 1976, Steve Jobs was just another guy looking for work. And like countless other hopefuls before and since, he had to fill out an 8.5-by-11-inch job application at some point. One of those documents, filled out and signed by an 18-year old Jobs and dated “1973” by another hand, is coming up for auction.
The single sheet of paper is being put up on the block by Boston-based RR Auction, with an expected sale price of $50,000. Jobs was a dropout at Reed College in Portland, Oregon, around the time of this application, auditing courses to save money. This means he was taking classes to expand his knowledge, but he wasn’t receiving grades or credit for the work.
Jobs took classes in Shakespeare, dance, and calligraphy, RR Auction reports. The latter would come full circle in the development of the Macintosh computer.
“If I had never dropped in on that single calligraphy course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts,” Jobs said in a Stanford University commencement speech in 2005.
Jobs filled out his application starting with his full name, “Steven jobs,” and listed “reed college” as his address. He jotted down “english lit” for his major and in the space for a phone number, he wrote “none.”
There is no past employment listed, though Jobs did have a driver’s license and “possible, not probable” access to transportation. In the Skills section, he checked off the Computer and Calculator fields, and wrote “design, tech” underneath them.
For Special Abilities, Jobs wrote “electronics tech or design engineer. digital. — from Bay near Hewitt-Packard [sic].” Though spelling and grammatical errors can spell disaster for an applicant, the ones strewn throughout this document didn’t seem to have hindered the future innovator and billionaire.
There is nothing here to indicate what position Jobs was applying for, but we do know that he started working at Atari in 1974. And the rest is history.
The auction site lists the document as being in “very good condition, with intersecting folds, overall creasing, light staining, and some old clear tape to the top edge.” It is accompanied by letters of authenticity from PSA/DNA and Beckett Authentication Services.
Jobs would have turned 63 this weekend on February 24. He died on October 5, 2011 due to complications from pancreatic cancer.
Bidding for lot number 5002, “Steve Jobs Signed Job Application,” will run from March 8 to 15.
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