  In 2002 the ATLAS experiment started a series of Data Challenges (DC) of
which the goals are the validation of the Computing Model, of the complete
software suite, of the data model, and to ensure the correctness of the
technical choices to be made. A major feature of the first Data Challenge (DC1)
was the preparation and the deployment of the software required for the
production of large event samples for the High Level Trigger (HLT) and physics
communities, and the production of those samples as a world-wide distributed
activity. The first phase of DC1 was run during summer 2002, and involved 39
institutes in 18 countries. More than 10 million physics events and 30 million
single particle events were fully simulated. Over a period of about 40 calendar
days 71000 CPU-days were used producing 30 Tbytes of data in about 35000
partitions. In the second phase the next processing step was performed with the
participation of 56 institutes in 21 countries (~ 4000 processors used in
parallel). The basic elements of the ATLAS Monte Carlo production system are
described. We also present how the software suite was validated and the
participating sites were certified. These productions were already partly
performed by using different flavours of Grid middleware at ~ 20 sites.
