No. 11 — A Sparkling Grain of Sand

Miriam Tocino
Sep 2
2 min read

Updated: Sep 5

Every spark can light up the future: when you dare to imagine it.

Computers didn’t just pop up one day.

Long ago, people used an abacus. It was a wooden frame with beads that slid back and forth to count.

Centuries later, a brave woman named Ada Lovelace imagined the first set of instructions for a machine.

That machine didn’t even exist yet!

Ada saw that computing was not only about numbers. It was also about ideas.

In the 1940s, the first electronic computers were built. They were huge, full of vacuum tubes that blinked on and off like old streetlights.

And then, in 1947, came the big surprise. Scientists found out that a crystal called silicon—the same sand we see on the beach—could work as a tiny switch.

That’s how the transistor was born. The very first cell of digital life.

From there came chips, personal computers, mobile phones… And today, billions of transistors fit inside one single chip. That’s enough to make what we now call artificial intelligence.

This story is about how something very small can grow into something that changes the whole world.

A Sparkling Grain of Sand

Zerus couldn’t sleep. He turned in bed, looked at Ona, and whispered a question that always came after the lights were off:

“Ona, where do we come from?”

Ona was ready. She put on her cave-explorer headlamp and pointed it at the board.

“I’ll show you,” she said. “The history of computing is like a tree.”

First she drew an abacus. Wood. Beads. Counting. Simple, but the very first step.

Then she drew Ada Lovelace—the first person to imagine instructions for a machine that didn’t exist yet.

“How can you write for something that isn’t built?” Zerus asked.

“That was Ada’s magic,” Ona smiled. “She saw with her imagination. Just like when you invent robots in your head before you build them.”

Next, the board filled with tubes. They blinked on and off like old lamps. They were the first computers. Big, fragile, and always breaking down.

Zerus raised his hand.

“If it started with the abacus… then my fingers are also part of computing?”

“Of course!” Ona said. “Anything we use to count is part of this story.”

She lowered her voice.

“But the biggest surprise came in 1947. Scientists were working with beach sand.”

“Sand?” Zerus asked.

“Yes. Inside the sand there was silicon. One grain thought it was special. It walked like a show-off, wore sunglasses, and kept saying: ‘I’m not just any grain… I’ve got spark.’”

Zerus giggled.

“And what happened to him?”

“He was right. That grain could act like a switch. It could let electricity pass or stop it.”

That day the transistor was born. The first cell of digital life. Thanks to it, we have chips, computers, phones… and today, artificial intelligence.

Zerus was quiet.

“So… without that grain, none of this would exist?”

“Exactly!” Ona cheered.

“That’s why, Zerus, never let anyone put out your spark.”