Trailblazer Who Paved the Way
Margaret Hamilton
Software Engineer & Computer Scientist - NASA
Her Story
Margaret Hamilton led the team that wrote the onboard flight software for the Apollo Guidance Computer, work used on every Apollo mission. She is widely credited with coining the term 'software engineering' at a time when the discipline wasn't taken seriously.
How She Got Into Tech
She studied mathematics and took a temporary programming job at MIT to support her family while her husband finished law school, work that led directly into the Apollo program.
A Day in Her Work
She and her team wrote, tested, and refined the flight software running onboard the Apollo Guidance Computer, building rigorous error-detection systems that most of the field considered unnecessary at the time.
Proudest Achievement
Her onboard software's error-detection system caught a critical computer overload minutes before the Apollo 11 lunar landing and let the mission continue safely.
Biggest Challenge
Convincing colleagues that software deserved the same engineering rigor as hardware, in a field that didn't yet formally recognize software engineering as a discipline.
Advice for the Next Generation
Insist on rigor and testing even when others consider it unnecessary. The unglamorous discipline is often what prevents catastrophe.
More
Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016 for her Apollo program work.
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