In reality, you can check your Bitcoin balance and transaction history directly with your own wallets, nodes and even don't need any Bitcoin block explorer to do it.
Bitcoin block explorers practically provide a lot of convenience for us. Obviously we have to be careful when using block explorers because they are centralized hosted and our privacy can be leaked. Use them with Tor connection if you do care about your privacy.
Let's return to this topic.
What is the first Bitcoin block explorer in history?
It is built by theymos. Are you surprised? :D
Bitcoin Block Explorer (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1727.0)
It used to be hosted at http://theymos.ath.cx:64150/bbe/
It was live on November 10, 2010.
At some points of time, it was mirror hosted at https://109.123.116.245/
Need mirror for blockexplorer.com (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=23340.msg313827#msg313827)
How does the first Bitcoin block explorer look like?
See its archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20101113061427/http://theymos.ath.cx:64150/bbe/
(https://i.ibb.co/tZzWCQQ/1.png) (https://ibb.co/q0CP177)
(https://i.ibb.co/nrZfWmD/2.png) (https://ibb.co/p2GZmw3)
(https://i.ibb.co/HNmXF0y/3.png) (https://ibb.co/SQqJs2g)
(https://i.ibb.co/tHGFzc4/4.png) (https://ibb.co/8mCtb20)
I use it to explore the Bitcoin Genesis block and get a result as follows.
- https://web.archive.org/web/20101113075930/http://theymos.ath.cx:64150/bbe/block/000000000019d6689c085ae165831e934ff763ae46a2a6c172b3f1b60a8ce26f
(https://i.ibb.co/SfY3y67/5.png) (https://ibb.co/FHZD3hq)
You want to have block explorers today?
- Get many of them from [Huge List] Bitcoin Helpful Links/ Tools (https://www.altcoinstalks.com/index.php?topic=315152.msg1466995#msg1466995)
Other hidden facts you did not know, I guess so, because I did not add it in OP.
- theymos initially launched the Block explorer as a close source (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1727.msg21321#msg21321), and told that he maybe make the code public later which never happened.
- He run it for a long time till 2012 not sure because theymos announced the new domain in 2010, but Wayback machine shows it in 2012 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1727.msg24009#msg24009) when he switched the domain to blockexplorer.com [1], before selling it (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1727.msg1539613#msg1539613) around Feb 2013 to Liraz.org (http://liraz.org/). The owner of Liraz site is Lira Siri (https://twitter.com/lirazsiri) (Twitter/ X). His account on Bitcointalk is liraz (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=78131).
- Lira Siri runs the Bitcoin block explorer for a while until May or June 2020 before made some change and later turned it to Joseon Explorer (https://www.blockexplorer.com/l/en-US/)
- Source of the information (https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1dkqcx/i_am_theymos_ama/)
[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20120308072440/http://blockexplorer.com/
Some screenshots for above information.
(https://i.ibb.co/dL4t0SK/6.png) (https://ibb.co/JyjqRNk)
(https://i.ibb.co/VmsvfPy/7.png) (https://ibb.co/KwJ9T3Z)
(https://i.ibb.co/qWXZv7x/8.png) (https://ibb.co/61VdkrN)
(https://i.ibb.co/Y0Y2DzR/9.png) (https://ibb.co/jJBhVc6)
(https://i.ibb.co/XkSDRzj/10.png) (https://ibb.co/846bZjN)
Blockchain.info possibly a second Bitcoin block explorer in history.
It was run by piuk (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=17928). Blockchain.info - Bitcoin Block explorer & Currency Statistics (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=40264.0) (announced in August 2011).
Note:
- It was posted first in that topic, on Bitcointalk (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5476842.0)
- I leave the source link to avoid plagiarism accusation.
- I excluded/ included minor things from an original thread if necessary.