The first email was sent in 1971 by Ray Tomlinson, an American computer engineer working at the company Bolt, Beranek and Newman (BBN) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The email was a test message sent between two computers sitting right next to each other on the ARPANET network. The content of the message was likely random characters such as "QWERTYUIOP." Ray Tomlinson is also credited with introducing the "@" symbol to designate email addresses, separating the user name from the host computer. This event marks the beginning of digital email communication as we know it today.