Bill Gates first used a computer at Lakeside School at age 13.
In 1968, Lakeside School in Seattle obtained access to a teletype terminal connected to a remote computer. Gates was then 13 years old. He quickly became fascinated by programming and spent substantial time experimenting with code, often alongside Paul Allen and other students.
The school’s computer access was unusual for the period and gave Gates a practical introduction to programming before personal computers became common. Gates and Allen later worked on software projects, including programs connected with traffic data and the Altair 8800.
This fact is sometimes confused with the name of the school or with the year Microsoft was founded. Lakeside provided the early computing opportunity in 1968, while Microsoft was established in 1975. The experience is widely cited as an important early influence on Gates’s career.