The Ballad of Morton Heilig: On VR's Mythic Past

Abstract

Virtual reality (VR) became a cultural fixture in the 1980s, when advances in computing inspired a general belief in VR's revolutionary potential. To support this belief, VR enthusiasts at that time also constructed an imagined history. This article examines VR's historiography through one of its most enduring myths: that filmmaker and inventor Morton Heilig developed analog VR in the 1950s but never received public recognition because few understood his vision. I argue that this narrative of Heilig as VR's forgotten prophet functioned to justify the putatively revolutionary project of VR and to legitimize the VR community that was promoting it.