In 1993, I, along with a few other teachers were given CORE (California Online Resources in Education) accounts after completing some pro.dev. courses in science, math and technology education.

I received my letter along with a username, a password and a phone number (I already had a Mac computer). I dialed the phone number, but got a very annoying sound. So I rang up one of my colleagues who I had attended the courses with. He laughed and then said "You'll need a modem to access the CORE directory" he then brough over his modem, we connected it to my Mac and my world was changed forever.

BTW-I met my husband online which is another story altogether :-)

Debra