Barstow Community College recommends the following website for more VR History
Virtual Speech - History of VR
1838 Sir Charles Wheatstone was the first to describe stereopsis in 1838 and was awarded the Royal Medal of the Royal Society in 1840 for his explanation of binocular vision, a research which led him to construct the stereoscope.
The research demonstrated that the brain combines two photographs (one eye viewing each) of the same object taken from different points to make the image appear to have a sense of depth and immersion (3-dimensional).
This technology enabled Wheatstone to create the earliest type of stereoscope. It used a pair of mirrors at 45 degree angles to the user’s eyes, each reflecting a picture located off to the side.
The Wheatstone mirror stereoscope.
1935 In 1935 Stanley Weinbaum released Pygmalion’s Spectacles – a science fiction story. The story’s main character wears a pair of goggles which transports him to a fictional world which stimulates his senses aptly and features holographic recordings. Some consider it to be the origin of the virtual reality (VR) concept as this story was a good prediction of the aims and achievements of the future.
Pygmalion’s Spectacles short story.