[wglb]

I was doing this in 1992 so it's at least 12 years older than the 2004 implementation

Try late 1960s. Generally known then, widely used.

For an interesting proof about tokens in ring buffers, check out https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/ewd04xx/EWD426.PDF, which, for 1974, has an interesting bit of multiprocessing.