Margaret Hamilton

Born on 17 August 1936 in Paoli, Indiana, Margaret Hamilton is a computer scientist who led the flight software programming team for NASA’s Apollo missions to the Moon. Hamilton earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and, at age 24, got a job at MIT as a programmer to develop meteorology software. In 1961 MIT was contracted by NASA to develop Apollo’s guidance system, and four years later Hamilton was put in charge of the software for navigation and lunar landing guidance. “For Hamilton, programming meant punching holes in stacks of punch cards, which would be processed overnight in batches on a giant Honeywell mainframe computer that simulated the Apollo lander’s work,” according to a 2015 Wired article . Her hard work paid off as the Eagle lander descended toward the Moon’s surface on 20 July 1969. The Apollo computer suddenly became overwhelmed, tasked with performing calculations unnecessary for the landing. But Hamilton and her team had prepared for such a possibility, coding in instructions that enabled the computer to correctly prioritize the most important commands. Hamilton stayed on at MIT to head the software programming for Apollo and Skylab. She went on to found and lead two companies, Higher Order Software and Hamilton Technologies. In 2016 she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Date in History: 17 August 1936