Too Long; Didn't Read
The input element was introduced in the first <a href="https://www.w3.org/MarkUp/HTMLPlus/htmlplus_41.html" target="_blank">HTML+ discussion document</a> in July 1993 for entering data in forms on the web. Dave Raggett’s iconic <a href="https://www.w3.org/TR/2018/SPSD-html32-20180315/#input" target="_blank">HTML 3.2 Reference Specification</a> in January 1997 included <code class="markup--code markup--p-code"><input type=file></code>from the 1995 memo <a href="https://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1867.txt" target="_blank">RFC1867</a> written by Xerox scientists Larry Masinter and Ernesto Nebel that described HTML forms with file submissions: