The document outlines a timeline of significant events in the history of libraries, museums, publishing, and computing, spanning from 530 BCE to 2007. It highlights the establishment of key libraries and museums, advancements in printing technology, and milestones in computing that have shaped the dissemination of knowledge. The information emphasizes the evolution of knowledge institutions and technologies that support access to information.

1. 2017 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31JANUARY
01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28FEBRUARY
01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31MARCH
01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30APRIL
MAY 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
JUNE 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
JULY 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
AUGUST 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
SEPTEMBER 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
OCTOBER 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
NOVEMBER 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
DECEMBER 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
libraries
museums
publishing
computing
ca. 530 BCE - Likely first museum is
established, curated by Princess
Ennigaldi-Nanna in what is now Iraq
4th c. BCE - The first
Athenaeum, at the Temple of
Athena, in ancient Greece
ca. 235 BCE - The
Library of Alexandria
is established in Egypt
AD 110 - Construction of the
Library of Celsus at Ephesus
begins in what is now Turkey
311 - Destruction of the
Library of Alexandria
1349 - Al-Karaouine
University Library estab-
lished in Fez, Morocco
1561 - Tian Yi Ge private
library established by Fan
family in Ningbo, China
14th c. - first purpose-
built library in Oxford,
England
1602 - Bodleian Library
established in Oxford,
England
1638 - John Harvard wills
400 books to what would
become Harvard University
1692 - France’s royal
library is expanded and
opens to the public
late 17th c. - first free
lending libraries established
in the American Colonies
1731 - Benjamin Franklin
founds The Library
Company of Philadelphia
1800 - United States’Library
of Congress is established
with a $5,000 appropriation
1833 - ”The Oldest Free Public Library
in the World Supported by Taxation”
was founded in Peterborough, New
Hampshire, USA
1971 - The Alden Library at
Ohio University creates first
online library catalog record
AD 1471 - Pope Sixtus IV
donates a collection of
ancient bronzes forming
the basis of The Capito-
line Museums in Rome
2016 - The Smithsonian’s
Museum of African
American History opens
1545 - Royal Armouries
in the Tower of London
becomes the first
museum in Britain when
a foreign dignitary pays
to view the collection
1630s - The Trades-
cant family of Britain
open their collections
(known as The 'Ark’)
to the public
1661 - The city of Basel purchases the
Amerbach Cabinet, arguably making
it the world’s oldest municipal art
collection
1677 - University of Oxford forms the Ashmolean
Museum - the oldest public museum in Britain, and
first purpose-built public museum in the world
1694 - Musee des Beaux-
Arts et d’Archeologie de
Besancon is established in
France 1727 - Kunstkamera is
completed in Saint Peters-
burg, becoming the first
museum in Russia
1753 - The British Museum is
founded, the first national public
museum in the world
1764 - Catherine the Great founds
the Hermitage Museum in Saint
Petersburg, home to the largest
collection of paintings in the world
1793 - The Louvre
opens in Paris
1846 - The United States
founds the Smithsonian
Institution
8th c. - wood block printing
emerges in China
AD 868 - Buddhist text "The
Diamond Sutra" created during
the Tang (T'ang) Dynasty
(618-909) in China.
ca. 235 BCE - Scribes and
copyists begin to duplicate
written works by hand for
deposit in the Library of
Alexandria
ca. 1041-1048 - Pi Sheng
invents movable type made
from clay, enabling the
printing of thousands of
copies of a document
relatively quickly
1377- a Korean monk named
Baegun prints "Jikji”, a compila-
tion of Buddhist sayings, believed
to be the oldest book in the world
printed with movable metal type
ca. 1440-1450 - Johann
Gutenberg invents the
Gutenberg Press, with
metal movable type
1728 - first recorded use of
the word“Athenaea”(plural
of“Athenaeum”)
1751 - Diderot’s“Ency-
clopédie, ou dictionnaire
raisonné des sciences,
des arts et des métiers”
is published
1879 - The Philological Society of
London contracts with the Oxford
University Press and James A. H.
Murray to begin work on the New
English Dictionary (later known as
the Oxford English Dictionary)
1821-1834 - Charles
Babbage conceives
the Difference Engine
#1, followed by the
Analytical Engine
1843 - Ada Lovelace
publishes first
description of a
computer program,
and envisions
mathematically-
based symbolic logic
1952 - Grace Hopper
writes A-0, a program that
allows a computer user to
use English-like words
instead of numbers to
give the UNIVAC I
computer instructions
ca. 1890 - Herman
Hollerith’s tabulat-
ing machine assists
in processing data
for the 1890 U.S.
Census
1942 - Hedy Lamarr
patents a system that
is the basis of today's
spread-spectrum
technology (CDMA,
Wi-Fi networks, and
Bluetooth)
1943-1944 -
John Mauchly
and J. Presper
Eckert build the
ENIAC,“the
grandfather”of
digital computers
1958 - Jack
Kilby and
Robert Noyce
unveil the
integrated
circuit
1972 - Karen Spärck
Jones publishes her
concept for inverse
document frequency
(IDF) weighting in
information retrieval,
now used by Google
1984 - The Apple
Macintosh debuts
1987 - The US National Science
Foundation starts NSFnet, precur-
sor to part of today's Internet
1989 - Tim Berners-
Lee conceptualizes
the World Wide Web
2007 -
Apple
releases
the iPhone
1985 - Aldus
develops Page-
Maker for the Mac,
the first "desktop
publishing"
application.
4th c. BCE - The
abacus may have
been invented in
Babylonia (now
Iraq)
1801 - Joseph Marie
Jacquard invents a loom that
uses punched wooden cards
to automatically weave fabric
designs
early 17th c. - Blaise Pascal creates an arithmetic
machine to assist with tax calculations
AD 8th-9th c. -
Arabic numerals
are introduced to
Europe
1993 -
BiblioBytes
launches
website to sell
ebooks over
the internet
Interesting dates in the history of libraries, museums, publishing, and computing
digital strategy + innovation consultants for 21st century knowledge ecosystems www.athenaeum21.com