In 1977, Hewlett-Packard introduced the original wristwatch-calculator combo, which was the first commercially available wearable computer. The 01 Wrist Instrument didn’t just provide a variety of functions–calculator, stopwatch, 200-year calendar, among them–it also allowed for the interaction of these functions. Portable tools have grown exponentially more sophisticated in the subsequent 35 years, but our general use of them seems to have remained simple and largely uninspired. Have the numbers we carry in our pockets shrunk so much that we’ve forgotten their value? Is the meaning reduced to so much lint? From the Hewlett-Packard Journal, December 1977:

“The concept of a combined wristwatch and calculator is a natural outgrowth of today’s digital watch and pocket calculator technologies. However, merely putting these two functions into one small case does not add significantly to the capabilities already available to the consumer. Only when the time and computation functions are allowed to interact freely can the full potential of the combination be realized and significant new capabilities be made available.

It is this interaction, along with state-of-the-art watch and calculator technologies, that provide the wearer of the HP-01 Wrist Instrument with the information that was previously unavailable, and makes the HP-01, after a brief experience with it, more difficult to do without than it might at first appear.”

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Hologram of HP-01 Wrist Instrument: