Happy birthday 'Apple genius' Steve Jobs, your memories live on
Today, it is the 65th birth anniversary of Steve Jobs, the late co-founder of Apple and a visionary leader, inventor, designer, and entrepreneur. Jobs was one of the biggest tech wizards of the late 20th century; his role and guidance made Apple the technology conglomerate it is. Here are some little-known facts about the man, the quintessential 'Apple genius'.
Jobs was adopted with a promise of college
Jobs was born to Abdulfattah Jandali and Joanne Schieble, but the couple gave him away to Paul and Clara Jobs after they promised proper education for Jobs. The promise was completed but only partially; Jobs did proper schooling, even skipped the sixth grade altogether, but dropped out of Oregon's Reed College because he thought it would be a waste of his parents' money.
One of his first jobs was at an Apple orchard
After leaving college, Jobs had a hard time. He continued attending some classes unofficially and used to sleep on the floors of his friends' dorm rooms. Plus, he used to collect empty coke bottles and exchange them for money and eat at a temple offering free meals on Sunday. During the same period, he worked at Apple orchard which also doubled as a commune.
In 1974, he visited India in search of spiritual enlightenment
After dropping out of college, Jobs visited India in search of 'spiritual enlightenment' and stayed at a few ashrams for about seven months. During this period, he became a practitioner of Zen Buddhism and changed his appearance by shaving his head and wearing traditional Indian clothing. He later used to engage in lengthy meditations at the Tassajara Zen Mountain Center in the US.
Jobs also experimented with LSD
While traveling around India, Jobs also experimented with psychedelic drugs, including LSD. He tried LSD a few times and called it "one of the two or three most important things I have done in my life."
Then, he worked for Atari, even stole from Wozniak
After returning from India, Jobs worked for Atari and created a circuit board for Atari's arcade video game breakout. Jobs and his partner Steve Wozniak had decided to split the earnings from the game evenly, but Jobs stole from Wozniak as he needed money. He gave Wozniak $350, telling him that the total amount received was $700. But, the actual payout was $5,000.
After a point, Jobs didn't like firing people at Apple
After developing the first Apple computer with Wozniak and starting the company, Jobs went on to become a tough boss with strict rules and principles. However, after he had children, he had a hard time firing people, as he used to think that it "could be one of my kids in 20 years. I never took it so personally before."
Jobs named Apple PC after his illegitimate daughter
Jobs also had an illegitimate child, Lisa Brennan, at the age of 23 but didn't accept paternity until years later. However, the interesting part is, just around the same time when Lisa was born, he had also named a new Apple computer as 'Lisa'. He claimed it stood for "Local Integrated Software Architecture" but later confirmed that "it was named for my daughter."
Multi-million dollar inheritance for Lisa
Notably, Jobs also left Lisa Brennan-Jobs - who changed her name after Jobs accepted paternity - a multi-million dollar inheritance. She used the money to support her mother and Jobs' ex-girlfriend Chrisann Brennan.
He refused liver transplant from current Apple CEO
Jobs and Apple's current CEO Tim Cook grew close at the company and their relationship was such that the latter offered Jobs his liver when he got sick from pancreatic cancer. However, Jobs turned him down, shouting at Cook, "I'll never let you do that. I'll never do that." In October 2011, Jobs passed away.
