ORIONOzarks Regional Information Online Network

Springfield, Missouri · 1994–2001

Before most of Springfield had the Internet, it had ORION

The library's free, text-only community network: a phone number, a modem, and a menu that put the whole region online for the price of a local call.

ORION was never meant to be an Internet provider. It was the Springfield-Greene County Library's idea of a public square: local news, school menus, bus schedules, election results and e-mail, free to anyone in the region with a terminal program. For a few years it was also the easiest way, and for many people the only way, to get online in the Ozarks. This site tells that story from ORION's own archived pages, its board minutes, and the newspapers of the time.

ATDT 864-6100 Dial in to a recreation of ORION in 1994 or 1997. Busy signals included.

The story

  1. 1985–1993

    Before ORION

    Bulletin boards in the 417, a state research network called MOREnet, and a free-net in Columbia that Springfield wanted one of.

    Coming soon
  2. 1993–1994

    Information is the new utility

    The library and four partners build a community network, and 1,100 people sign up before it opens.

  3. 1994–1995

    The text years

    Numbered menus on a Sun server in Columbia, the first spam crash, Santa's e-mail address, and a users' group born from a complaint.

  4. 1995–1996

    orion.org

    A new domain, Lynx instead of numbers, a federal grant, and a week offline to make the move to the Web.

  5. 1996–1997

    48 modems, still busy

    IRC arrives for Christmas, the user count passes 13,000, and AOL's flat rate changes everyone's math.

  6. 1998

    The New ORION

    A budget gap, a $12 donation appeal, a town hall, and the decision to stop being everyone's dial-up.

  7. 1999–2001

    Last modems off

    The corporation dissolves into the library, ORION Community carries on, and the e-mail ends in 2001.

  8. 1994–today

    The Ozarks get online

    The local ISPs, the $19.95 era, @Home and the cable shutdown, and City Utilities' fiber reaching every address.

Were you on ORION?

If you had an account, worked the helpdesk, sat on the board, or just remember the busy signals, we'd like to hear from you. Your userid, the menus you used, what you did on it, how it ended for you. Share a memory →