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When was e-mail invented?

A short term for "electronic mail," e-mail was in use by the end of the 1970s. The invention of the modem, an electronic device that connects a computer to a telephone line, made possible the transmission of electronic messages. Within a decade of its introduction, e-mail had become a widely used communications mode for businesses. By the 1990s e-mail was a part of everyday life in workplaces and in homes.

Further Information: Brimner, Larry Dane. E-mail. New York: Children's Press, 1997; What Is the History of E-mail?[Online] Available http://www.aptosjr.santacruz.k12.ca.us/computers/page9.html, November 8, 2000.

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1. Galileo Galilei