Inside MIT’s Hobby Shop

It’s remarkable how the MIT Hobby Shop presages aspects of the hackerspace movement…

In the 1937-38 academic year, Vannevar Bush, then Vice President of MIT, granted a group of 16 MIT students permission to use a room in the basement of building 2. With equipment they found around the Institute they set up a wood and metal shop in the 16-foot by 22-foot area. The club members chose the name “Hobby Shop” based on their belief in the philosophy that the well rounded individual pursued interests outside their profession – hobbies.

Now in its 75th year, we take a look back how the Hobby Shop began, and evolved to what it is today.