Steve Jobs’ 1973 First Job Application Sells for $122,000 at Goldin

A handwritten job application filled out by Steve Jobs years before Apple existed has sold for $122,000 at Goldin. The one-page document dates to 1973, when Jobs was 18 years old, and is signed simply “Steven jobs.” The historic application has been authenticated and encapsulated by PSA/DNA with a Mint 9 grade.

Goldin offered the application as part of its latest auction, where the final price reached $122,000. What makes the document particularly interesting is how ordinary Jobs’ circumstances looked at the time. He listed his address as “reed college,” gave his major as “english lit” and wrote “none” in the space asking for a phone number. When asked whether he had access to transportation, Jobs answered, “possible, but not probable.”

The technology interests that would eventually define his career were already evident. Jobs answered “yes (design, tech)” when asked about experience with computers and calculators. Under special abilities, he wrote about electronics, digital technology and being a “tech or design engineer,” while also referencing the Bay Area and Hewlett-Packard, which he misspelled on the form.

Exactly what job Jobs was seeking with the application has never been definitively established. RR Auction, which previously handled the document, noted two possibilities: that Jobs used it for work repairing electronics in Reed College’s psychology department or that it was connected to his eventual technician position at Atari. Jobs joined Atari in 1974. Two years later, he and Steve Wozniak founded Apple.

The application has already had an unusual life on the collectibles market. RR Auction sold the Steve Jobs job application for $175,471 including buyer’s premium in March 2018. It later appeared in RR Auction’s 2022 PSA Encapsulated Autograph Auction, by which point it had been graded PSA/DNA Mint 9 and carried an estimate of more than $300,000.

The document measures 8.5 by 11 inches and shows the wear expected from something that was never created with collecting in mind. RR Auction previously described intersecting folds, creasing, light staining and old clear tape along the top edge. Despite that, PSA/DNA assigned the encapsulated piece its Mint 9 autograph grade.