THE NAVY RETIRED HER AT 60. EIGHT MONTHS LATER THEY WANTED HER BACK.
There may be no better woman with whom to finish this series.
Grace Hopper helped pioneer the world of computer programming.
A mathematician who joined the US Navy Reserve during the Second World War, Hopper worked with some of the earliest large-scale computers.
But she had an idea that would help transform computing.
Programming shouldn't remain trapped in obscure machine instructions understandable only to a tiny number of specialists.
Computers needed languages that humans could use more easily.
Hopper became one of the pioneers of the compiler — software capable of translating more human-readable instructions into something a computer could execute.
Her work contributed to the development of programming languages and she played an important role in the emergence of COBOL.
Then came 1966.
Grace Hopper reached 60.
The Navy's age rules forced her into retirement.
Apparently that was that.
Except the Navy had a problem.
Its growing collection of computer systems and programming languages needed somebody who understood how to bring order to the chaos.
Eight months later, the Pentagon called.
Would Grace Hopper come back?
Of course she would.
Hopper returned to active duty and remained in uniform until 1986.
She finally retired at 79 years old, by then a rear admiral and the oldest commissioned officer serving in the US Navy.
That is where we'll finish our three weeks of Women Who Built the Future.
Not with a woman whose best years were supposedly behind her.
But with a woman whose employer retired her because of her age...
and then discovered they still needed her expertise.
Perhaps that's the perfect introduction to what comes next.
WRINKLES IN THE FABRIC
with Dr Kathryn Spurling
Conversations with remarkable women over 55.
Women who built things.
Changed things.
Survived things.
Led things.
Discovered things.
And still have plenty left to say.
A woman's story doesn't end at 55.
Sometimes that's where it gets interesting.
The US Naval History and Heritage Command records Hopper's pioneering compiler work, her forced retirement at 60, recall to active service months later, and final retirement at 79.