Spongebob Squarepants first episode aired in 1999,the cartoon was created by Stephen Hillenburg on United States.He got the idea of making Spongebob Squarepants because he was working on the Oceanic Institute(from 1984 to 1987)he writed a comic called ''The Intertidal Zone''.He showed it to his friend Martin Olson and one of the writers of ''Rocko's Modern Life''.Olson liked his job and suggested to Hillenburg to rewrite it so its a a serie of underwater drawings. In 1998 he decided to show his work to Nickelodeon.He thus developed what was to be the pilot chapter:''Help Wanted''.Spongebob was originally called SpongeBoy,but it was a name already registered,so he changed it to Spongebob.Nickelodeon published the first episode on the 1th of May of 1999.5 years later on 2004 when ''The Spongebob Movie'' was released he leaved the executive production and involucrate on other projects,leaving the principal executive production to Paul Tibbitt.But when ''Spongebob Out Of Water''released on 2015 he later retaked his job as a executive producer.But then on March of 2017 he announced that he suffered of ''amyotrophic lateral sclerosis'' (ALS) a neurodegenerative disease for which a cure didnt existed.The 27th of November of 2018 the Nickelodeon account of Twitter announced that at 57 years old Stephen Hillenburg sadly passed away(Rest in peace Stephen Hillenburg).The day after his death, his remains were cremated and his ashes scattered into the Pacific Ocean 500 miles off the coast of California. In July of 2019 the episode ''SpongeBob's Big Birthday Blowout''was released,which celebrated the 20 years of Spongebob,and was a tribute to Stephen Hillenburg.