Queen Elizabeth II Sends First Tweet, Makes History--Find Out What She Said on Twitter!
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Queen Elizabeth II has sent her first tweet, marking the first social media message posted by or posted on behalf of a reigning British monarch.
Wearing a robin egg blue dress coat and matching hat, the 88-year-old grandmother of Prince William and Prince Harry was photographed touching an iPad on a display table at the Science Museum in London during an information technology gallery opening on Friday. A tweet containing her personal sign-off, Elizabeth R., was posted on the @BritishMonarchy account at 11:35 a.m. local time. R stands for Regina, or queen.
"It is a pleasure to open the Information Age exhibition today at the @ScienceMuseum and I hope people will enjoy visiting. Elizabeth R," read the tweet, which has been retweeted at least 18,000 times as of Friday.
The @BritishMonarchy account was opened in 2009 to share news about the Royal Family and has until Friday only been accessed by palace officials. The page has more than 760,000 followers, a number that is rising swiftly due to the queen's tweet.
"The last tweet was sent personally by The Queen from her official Twitter account @BritishMonarchy #TheQueenTweets," the Science Museum's Twitter page read.
"Something one doesn't see everyday... The Queen sends her first tweet to open #smInfoAge #TheQueenTweets," the group added.
It is unclear if the queen typed the message herself. One of the event's attendees, Baroness Martha Lane Fox, posted on her Twitter page a photo of a man holding an iPad displaying the British Monarchy's Twitter page and a blank window above several tweets.
"LOVE Chi who was in charge of the @BritishMonarchy iPad + 'ones first tweet,'" Fox said.
She also shared a photo of the queen in front of the iPad, taken from behind, on her Instagram page.
"Well here's a thing @britishmonarchy sends her first tweet - nicely done HRH @sciencemuseum," she said.
Harry had posted his first personal tweet in May, on the official page of the Invictus Games, which he attended in September. The prince said the following month that he hates Twitter.
Queen Elizabeth II's tweet follows several other of her historic technological moves.
"I mentioned earlier that Queen Victoria took a great interest in the invention of the telephone and Your Majesty has followed in this tradition of embracing new technology, The U.K. newspaper The Guardian quoted Science Museum Director Ian Blatchford as saying at a ceremony attended by Queen Elizabeth II, husband Prince Philip, 93, and some 600 guests.
"You made the first live Christmas broadcast in 1957 and an event relished by historians took place on 26 March 1976, when you became the first monarch to send an email, during a visit to the Royal Signals and Radar Establishment," he added. "May I now invite you to join me so that you may send your first tweet."
Photos and videos of both milestone events Blatchford mentioned were posted on the British Monarchy's Twitter page.
At the Science Museum, queen also received a gift, a technology-themed "bouquet," which was presented to her by a little girl.
"To thank The Queen, our inventor-in-residence @markchampkins designed this beautiful Information bouquet #smInfoAge," read another tweet on the museum's page.
"Pleased that all the effort paid off and bouquet was well received, particularly as it took bloomin ages to make," Mark Champkins said on his personal Twitter page.
He said the gift took three days to create and was made from computer punch cards and ticker tape from a Pegasus computer, one of the oldest computers in the world made up of several parts, including a large container that resembles a group of several small storage lockers.
"The tape was often used as confetti in times of celebration #smInfoAge," the museum's page added.
The Pegasus computer was invented by British company Ferranti and first went into service in 1956, almost three years after Queen Elizabeth II's coronation. One was restored and lives, fully oper
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