Video Game Controller Recovered from Landfill, Alamogordo, New Mexico, April 26, 2014, Site of the Atari Video Game Burial of 1983
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In 1983, rumors circulated: Atari was bankrupt, and was dumping truckloads of games into a New Mexico landfill. Victim to the "Video Game Crash," the company buried 700,000 cartridges in the desert. The story became an obscure pop culture legend -- until "The Atari Tomb" was unearthed in 2014. This recovered controller is evidence of the world's first video game excavation.
In 1983, rumors circulated: Atari was bankrupt, and was dumping truckloads of games into a New Mexico landfill. Victim to the "Video Game Crash," the company buried 700,000 cartridges in the desert. The story became an obscure pop culture legend -- until "The Atari Tomb" was unearthed in 2014. This recovered controller is evidence of the world's first video game excavation.
Artifact
Input device
Date Made
circa 1980
Creators
On Exhibit
at Henry Ford Museum in Your Place in Time
Object ID
2015.13.4
Credit
From the Collections of The Henry Ford. Gift of the City of Alamogordo, New Mexico.
Material
Plastic
Dimensions
Height: 9 in
Width: 1.75 in
Length: 7 in
Inscriptions
Video Touch Pad
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