How A Metro Atlanta Museum Is Preserving—and Bringing to Life—Tech History

ROSWELL, GA, July 23 (Hypepotamus) - Inside a Roswell storefront, more than 2,000 artifacts tell the story of how Apple grew from a California startup into one of the world’s most influential technology companies.

The Mimms Museum of Technology and Art holds one of the largest private collections of computing history in the country. And now on display is an immersive look at Apple’s first 50 years.  

PRESENTED BY callrail

Make every text, call, and lead count. CallRail connects the dots between your campaigns, conversations, and customers.

Step Inside iNSPIRE

You might expect to have to go to the Bay Area to explore Apple’s history. The museum's newest permanent exhibition, iNSPIRE, traces Apple's history through more than 2,000 original physical artifacts and documents that can only be discovered in Roswell, Georgia. Those who walk through the exhibition rooms will see early patents, a prototype of their original logic board, the first Apple II floppy disc, and the second check ever written from Apple, signed by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. 

For Rena Youngblood, the museum's executive director, the exhibit is less about the products than the decisions behind them. 

"Most people know Apple because of products like the iPhone and Mac. We wanted visitors to understand the journey behind those products — the creativity, risk-taking, failures, perseverance, and collaboration that drive meaningful innovation," Youngblood said. "Technology doesn't happen in isolation; it intersects with art, design, education, music, accessibility, and culture."

For Baby Boomers, Gen Xers, and Millennials, the museum offers a nostalgic trip down memory lane. Inside the collection you will find 1980s computers that have the original Oregon Trail video game, every version of the iPod created on a unique timeline, and different iterations of the personal computer that came out over the decades.

Archiving Beyond Apple

The Mimms Museum, founded by longtime collector and Georgia Tech graduate Lonnie Mimms and his wife, Karin Mimms, opened to the public in 2019 under its original name, the Computer Museum of America. It was rebranded as the Mimms Museum of Technology and Art in March 2025, a shift meant to reflect a collection that has grown well beyond hardware.

Beyond the Apple exhibit, the museum’s permanent collection includes a tribute to space exploration built around NASA-era hardware — an IBM 3420, a front panel from an IBM 360, and dioramas spanning Apollo 11 through 17 — alongside a collection of vintage supercomputers and a timeline of computer chip design. There is also an original Enigma machine from World War II, an original IBM punchcard machine (that is still working), and a Hayes Smartmodem, a nod to how Atlanta created our modern digital world. 

Behind all of it is Lonnie Mimms' own collection, assembled over nearly 50 years. 

"Lonnie has spent nearly 50 years collecting significant artifacts from the history of computing, and that collection has become the foundation of what is now the Mimms Museum of Technology and Art," Youngblood said.

In 2024, the museum acquired the Living Computer Museum collection from the estate of Microsoft co-founder Paul G. Allen.

The permanent facility wasn't the first attempt. Before signing a lease in Metro Atlanta, the Mimmses tested the concept with pop-up exhibitions. 

"Those temporary exhibits demonstrated there was strong public support for preserving and sharing the stories of technology, laying the groundwork for a permanent institution," Youngblood told Hypepotamus. 

How Atlanta Shaped Tech History

The startup world is inherently forward-looking. Investors are searching for the next big thing. Founders are constantly thinking about how to stay ahead of the competition. Pitches and Demo Days focus on what new technologies are set to arrive next on the scene. From revenue projections to customer acquisition

HypepotamusMaija Ehlinger

Why Roswell

The location is deliberate. Roswell sits inside a metro area Youngblood describes as the "Silicon Valley of the South,” a description she extends into the museum's stated ambitions. 

"Its location places the museum at the heart of one of the nation's fastest-growing technology ecosystems, surrounded by global companies, startups, research institutions, and entrepreneurs who are shaping the future of innovation," she said.

Youngblood is direct about what she wants visitors to take from a walk through the exhibits, whether visitors are engineers, entrepreneurs, or budding technologists who come for various camps hosted at the museum. 

"I hope people leave with a sense of possibility," she said. "Innovation isn't reserved for a select few — it's a mindset built on curiosity, creativity, resilience, and collaboration."