California Wildfires Destroyed Part of Hewlett-Packard Archives

California’s deadliest wildfires have also destroyed an irreplaceable collection of Silicon Valley history.

The Santa Rosa Press Democrat reported that more than 100 boxes of letters and other materials from tech pioneers William Hewlett and David Packard burned in the fires.

Hewlett and Packard started an early technology company in a Palo Alto, Calif., garage in 1938. They founded Hewlett-Packard, now known as HP. Former HP archivist Karen Lewis says the trove contained “the history of Silicon Valley.”

Electronics firm Keysight Technologies had acquired the archives through spinoffs, and the archives were stored at its offices in Santa Rosa. The two buildings burned when fires raged through part of Santa Rosa.

Keysight spokesman Jeff Weber says his company had taken “appropriate and responsible steps” to safeguard the history.

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Topics California Catastrophe Natural Disasters Wildfire