Although it looks more like a doorstop than a computer gadget, the first mouse was actually at the forefront of technology back in the sixties. First introduced by genius inventor Douglas Engelbart in 1964 at Stanford Research Institute, this beautifully shellacked square block was the granddaddy of today’s more sophisticated mouse.

Unlike the modern mouse, which uses either a ball or light to move the pointer in any direction, Douglas Engelbart’s mouse had two wheels perpendicular to each-other, meaning that the mouse was limited to a single movement along an axis. The mouse evolved surprisingly fast, as you can see in this video of Douglas Engelbart at 1968 Fall Joint Computer conference demonstration, Douglas Engelbart is using a slightly more sophisticated mouse with full range of movement.