Margaret Hamilton: A Zine

MARGARET HAMILTON

A Zine by Elissa Padula

WHO IS

MARGARET HAMILTON? The woman who saved the moon mission landing you may have never heard of...

In 1969... Hamilton’s software engineering and

code programming allowed for Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to successfully land on the moon when an alarm was triggered, jeopardizing the whole mission.

It was Margaret Hamilton herself who first used and popularized the term ‘software engineer’. Her engineering and computer science abilities were what allowed for not only the successful landing, but the personal safety of the astronauts on the Apollo 11 mission. The job that she and her team were assigned to do was unheard of and had never been done before.

“At Tranquility Base” Courtesy of NASA

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amilton was born August 17th, 1936 in Paoli, Indiana. Before her involvement with NASA, she was a high school math teacher. Briefly after, she was hired as a professor at MIT, where she furthered her research on software programming, specifically in weather forecasting and meteorology.

Margaret Hamilton then joined the SAGE project at MIT, designing software Margaret Hamilton to detect enemy Courtesy of NASA aircraft as the first U.S. air defense system. During the 1960s, she led a team at NASA to design software for the flight control systems of the Apollo missions. She worked to develop a way for information to be recovered during a computer malfunction, which was against the advice of her male superiors. Going against these orders, Hamilton integrated these codes into the Apollo 11 mission anyways and actually saved the mission during a system overload.

“Apollo 11 Launches” Courtesy of NASA

always listen “ Don’t to the so-called experts...”

- Margaret Hamilton, on why she went against the orders of her male bosses

WHAT WOULD A

MARGARET HAMILTON MONUMENT LOOK LIKE?

“Margaret Hamilton in action” Courtesy of Wikipedia

I

n a field dominated by men, Margaret Hamilton was able to successfully lead her team to victory and save the Apollo 11 mission. Without her contributions to computer science, Armstrong and Aldrin might have never walked on the moon – an accomplishment exclusive to the United States alone. Hamilton deserves a monument in her name for her contributions made both in space exploration and for women in science. A monument is necessary to not only thank her for the work she has done in the realm of computer programming, but to inspire young women to keep pursuing their goals and never be intimidated by a male-dominated career path.

Digital Monument Rendering Digitization of what the proposed monument would look like

ONE GIANT MOON FOR WOMANKIND...

T

he proposed monument features a hollow 12-foot copper sphere of the moon, to represent Hamilton’s involvement with NASA’s space missions. Carved into the outside of the structure will be textured binary code wrapping all the way around the orb. The coding pays homage to Hamilton’s career as a software engineer and a coding specialist.

The entire monument will rest on a sturdy pedestal, with a special engraving dedicated to Hamilton and other women in STEM fields.

Close-Up Look The entire outside of the monument is set to be covered in binary code, carved into the copper sphere

First Monument Sketch The original drawing which inspired the proposed monument

WHERE ON EARTH? (OR OFF)

Paoli, Indiana Hamilton’s hometown

Nguyen Engineering Building at GMU The most fitting place for the Margaret Hamilton monument would be the Long and Kimmy Nguyen Engineering Building on the George Mason Fairfax campus.

Students would see the structure walking into the building or simply walking past along the path. Cars and other traffic on the road parallel would also have a good view of the monument.