It cost $18,000 when it was introduced in 1965, but it bridged the world between room-size mainframes and the modern desktop.

Gordon Bell, a true visionary in the world of computing who helped design some of the first minicomputers in the 1960s, died May 17 at the age of 89, according to a new report from the New York Times.

Computer pioneer Gordon Bell, who as an early employee of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) played a key role in the development of several influential minicomputer systems and also co-founded the first major computer museum,