About Me
Mark Garlanger
I started working(playing) with computers around 1981, when I was in 6th grade. Our school had received a few Atari 400 and Atari 800 computers. Every Friday during our Math class, our class was taught the BASIC language. This was the start of my interest in computers. During this time, my father worked at Heath Company as a Technician. Occasionally, he was able to bring home an H89 for the weekend. I would be playing on the system all weekend. I received my own H89 (which I built with my dad), for Christmas in 1983.
The system got several upgrades, including a soft-sectored controller, and additional drives for a total of 3 hard-sectored drives, and 2 double-sided 96tpi and 1 double-sided 48tpi soft-sectored drives. With the system, I learned Pascal with Borland's Turbo Pascal.
Unfortunately, to help fund my next computer, a Heathkit H-158, I needed to sell the H89 system. It wasn't until 2003, that I bought another H89, unfortunately, all the software I originally had was long gone. I had met someone in college who also had an H89 and gave her all the disks, with the requirement of getting copies of the software on the disks, but that never happened.
Since 2003, I've acquired a large amount of Heathkit related equipment, documentation, and software, thanks in part to generous donations from many people. I've also spent a bunchof money on sites like ebay and craigslist.
Eventually, I'd love to setup a real museum for all this equipment, but that definitely won't happen until I have much more time on my hands. For now, the goal is to properly inventory all the items and have a virtual museum which anyone with a web browser can visit.
