Amaya Toman Almost every supporter of Apple knows that three people were initially responsible for its birth - in addition to Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, there was also Ronald Wayne, but he left the company literally a few days after it was officially founded. In today's installment of our series on Apple's historical events, we remember this very day.
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Ronald Wayne, the third of the founders of Apple, decided to leave the company on April 12, 1976. Wayne, who once worked with Steve Wozniak at Atari, sold his stake for $800 when he left Apple. As Apple became one of the most successful companies in the world, Wayne often had to face questions about whether he regretted leaving. "I was in my forties at the time and the boys were in their twenties," Ronald Wayne once explained to reporters that staying at Apple at the time seemed too risky to him.
Ronald Wayne has never expressed regret about his departure from Apple. When Jobs and Wozniak became millionaires in the 1980s, Wayne did not envy them in the slightest. He always claimed that he never had a reason for envy and bitterness. When Steve Jobs returned to Apple in the mid-nineties, he invited Wayne to the presentation of the new Macs. He arranged for him a first-class flight, a pick-up from the airport in a car with a personal driver and luxury accommodation. After the conference, the two Steves met up with Ronald Wayne in the cafeteria at Apple headquarters, where they reminisced about the good old days.
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Ronald Wayne managed to do quite a lot for the company even in such a short time of his tenure at Apple. In addition to the valuable advice he gave to his younger colleagues, for example, he was also the author of the company's first ever logo - it was the well-known drawing of Isaac Newton sitting under an apple tree. An inscription with a quote from the English poet William Wordsworth stood out on the logo: "A mind forever wandering in strange waters of thought". At the time, he wanted to incorporate his own signature to the logo, but Steve Jobs removed it, and a little later, Way's logo was replaced by a bitten apple by Rob Janoff. Wayne was also the author of the first contract in the history of Apple - it was a partnership agreement that specified the duties and responsibilities of the individual founders of the company. While Jobs took care of marketing and Wozniak the practical technical stuff, Wayne was in charge of overseeing documentation and the like.
As far as relations with the other Apple founders are concerned, Wayne has always been closer to Wozniak than to Jobs. Wozniak is described by Wayne as the kindest person he has ever met. “His personality was infectious,” he once stated. Wayne also described Steve Wozniak as determined and focused, while Jobs was more of a cold person. "But that's what made Apple what it is now," he pointed out.
