Elektro

Elektro was a 7-foot, 265-pound humanoid robot built by Westinghouse for the 1939 New York World's Fair. He could walk by voice command, speak about 700 words (using a 78-rpm record player), smoke cigarettes, blow up balloons, and move his head and arms. Elektro was accompanied by Sparko, a robotic dog that could beg, bark, and sit. While primitive by modern standards — his movements were driven by motors, cams, and telephone relays — Elektro was the first robot most Americans ever encountered. He established the expectation that robots would be humanoid and that they would interact with people through natural language, expectations that persist to this day.