George C. Devol Jr. filed US Patent 2,988,237, titled “Programmed Article Transfer,” on December 10, 1954. It was granted on June 13, 1961. The patent describes a reprogrammable manipulator whose motion sequences are stored on a magnetic drum and can be, in the patent’s words, “readily erased for re-recording.” This invention became the Unimate, the first industrial robot, commercialized by Unimation and installed at General Motors.