The First Computer Programmer is a Woman

Ada Bryon was the daughter of Lord Byron the poet and Anne Milbanke. She was born in London, England in 1815. Her parents separated a month after she was born.  She never met her father.   Ada’s mother made sure that Ada was educated in Mathematics and Science.  Ada was a very smart young lady and excelled in Mathematics.  When she was 18, she attended a party at her tutor’s home, Mary Somerville.  During the party she met a scientist, Charles Babbage.  Charles was the inventor of the difference engine, the world's first programmable automatic digital calculating machine.  Charles told her about his difference engine and she was intrigued.  She later visited his studio and then began corresponding with Charles on a regular basis, asking questions and learning everything she could about his invention.

In 1835 Ada married William King.  A few years later William became Earl of Lovelace and Ada became the Countess of Lovelace.  Her husband supported Ada and encouraged her to keep in touch with Charles Babbage.   She also attended many lectures where the difference engine was discussed and she took detailed notes.

During this time Charles had made plans for an analytical engine. Ada was one of the few people who understood this machine. The difference engine required a human programmer to set the initial values to enter data. The analytical engine used cards. It would respond to general instructions that were on the cards.

Ada understood that a machine like this had great possibilities, a machine that could make choices and had a memory. She knew a machine like this could perform difficult mathematical problems without errors and could even generate music.  She wrote detailed examples of how this machine would function and how it would contribute to the advancement of science. 

Ada was the first woman in the “computer science” field.  Even though during this time period there was no computer science field, and women were considered to frail to understand mathematics or science. Her detailed instructions and knowledge of how the analytical engine could function has earned her the title of the first computer programmer.

She died at the age of 36 of cancer and is buried along side her father. In 1980 the United States Department of Defense named their new programming language Ada in honor of Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace