Apache was originally the NCSA httpd. However this server languished, and people had patches around to extend httpd to do what they needed or to fix bugs. Eventually a group of people got together and collated all the patches into one server which was "a patchy server" or the "Apache server".
Apache is one of the critical components of LAMP (Linux/Apache/Mysql/Php).
2 pages link to ApacheNotes:
