Apple II Bits

I’ve lived my entire life in Massachusetts, having often driven or cycled the roads between Boston and my hometown to visit family. One particular path to my cousin’s house has always brought a smile to this Apple II user’s face.

AppleWorks is many things: it’s a word processor; it’s an environment in which I spent twenty years building my portfolio and honing my craft; it’s a legendary Apple product that Quality Computers got the rights to upgrade; it’s a program from a company with a complicated history; it’s compiled from source code we’ll almost certainly never see.

But in the small town of Harvard, Mass., it’s also a company.

Bold move, Cotton. Let’s see if it pays off.

I’ve driven by this sign many times — you can see it from the road on Google Maps.

For decades, I’ve wondered how this company has retained its name, especially given how boldly it hangs its shingle. Apple is infamously litigatious, and any company that overlaps with the computer manufacturer’s industry would be susceptible to a threat to change its name, which Steve Jobs would consider no big deal.

Has the AppleWorks business held the name since before the Apple II existed? Was it a publishing company or computer repair service? If not, why would the owners name it Appleworks? Were they taking inspiration from being two towns over from Johnny Appleseed’s hometown?

After years of wondering these questions, it wasn’t until I sat down to write this blog post last night that I finally got the answer: Appleworks isn’t a business; it’s a place. It’s the name of the strip mall that houses the Siam Pepper Thai Cuisine restaurant whose website gave me the clue I needed, listing its address as “Appleworks Building, Harvard, MA”.

At first, this revelation felt anti-climactic — but now I’m free to drive by this building, smile, and rest easy that it’s an unlikely target for Apple legal.