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Steve Jobs' 1973 Job Application Sells for $174K

The one-page document, which Jobs filled out while at Reed College, generated over 30 bids on a original estimated value at over $50,000.

By Michael Kan
March 16, 2018
Steve Jobs

An old job application that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs filled out back in 1973 has been sold at auction for $174,757.

The one-page document, complete with grammar and spelling errors, was put up for sale on RR Auction, which estimated its value at over $50,000. Clearly, it was worth far more; the job application received over 30 bids until the auction ended on Thursday.

Steve Jobs Application AuctionJobs originally filled out the application three years before Apple's founding. Back in 1973, he had dropped out from Reed College in Oregon, but remained on campus, auditing classes.

The document doesn't state the position Jobs was applying for, but it offers an early glimpse at the Apple co-founder's modest beginnings. On the question over whether he had access to transportation, Jobs wrote: "possible, but not probable."

Under special abilities he also wrote, "Electronics tech or design engineer. Digital. From Bay near Hewitt-Packard," mispelling the name of Hewlett-Packard.

RR Auction hasn't revealed the winning bidder for the prized document, but the anonymous buyer paid a steep price. The job application previously went up for sale at another auction house, where it sold for a mere $18,750.

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RR Auction also sold two other documents signed by Jobs. A newspaper clipping from 2008 about Apple introducing the iPhone 3G sold for $26,950. The other document, a Mac OS X manual published in 2001 and signed with the words "All the best, Steve Jobs," fetched $41,806 during the auction.

According to RR Auction, Jobs often declined to give autographs. However, he decided to sign the newspaper clipping and Mac OS manual because the autograph seekers were persistent, and cajoled Jobs into writing his name on the documents.

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About Michael Kan

Senior Reporter

I've been with PCMag since October 2017, covering a wide range of topics, including consumer electronics, cybersecurity, social media, networking, and gaming. Prior to working at PCMag, I was a foreign correspondent in Beijing for over five years, covering the tech scene in Asia.

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