Margaret Hamilton, the computer pioneer whose software powered the first moon landing, has died at the age of 90. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announced her passing on Wednesday. Hamilton, who died on September 30, was a trailblazer in a time when titles like software engineer and computer scientist were not yet mainstream.
Early Career and Contributions
Hamilton began her programming journey under the guidance of a renowned MIT meteorologist. She honed her skills in an MIT laboratory, where she developed software capable of detecting enemy aircraft. When MIT secured a contract with NASA to create the onboard flight software for the Apollo missions, she eagerly accepted the challenge.
““I was attracted both by the sheer idea and the fact that it had never been done before. I was the first programmer to join and the first woman they hired,” she told the Guardian in 2019.
