A Computer Genius Granny.

Alex’s teacher refused to believe him and his parents had to and explain to the teacher that Betty Jean and 5 other women had indeed, legally hacked the world’s first programmable computer, converting it into a stored machine and eventually helping to usher in the digital age.

This teacher and the historians were all dumbfounded. No one had the acknowledged the wartime contributions of the 6 women who programming the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC)

In 1945, Betty Jean was one of a handful of female math majors at what was then Northwest Missouri State Teachers College. As the war came to a close, the Army had run out of male mathematicians. Betty Jean answered a recruitment ad for women “computers” in a classified project. She said: “I wanted to do something exciting, adventuresome and I wanted to get to the big city and see what life was like.”

Betty Jean went on to help program the BINAC for Northrop Aircraft Company in 1949 and design logic for UNIVAC I, the first commercial computer delivered to the U.S. Census Bureau in 1951. After that, she took time off to raise three children, but then returned in 1967 to help businesses understand the new microcomputers. Betty Jean’s story — a sort of Rosie the Riveter meets Bill Gates — recalls the enormous talent women have brought to computer technology and illustrates the challenges today’s women face in what’s still a male-dominated field.

But Betty Jean and her colleagues were ignored by History. At the 40th anniversary of the ENIAC project at the University of Pennsylvania in 1946, the women were initially not invited — only one was on the list as a spouse. But now, a documentary film — “Invisible Computers: The Story of the ENIAC Programmers”

Betty Jean lives in New Jersey and, after the incident with her grandson Alex’s teacher; she visits schools to tell her story. She also stays involved her alma mater, now Northwest Missouri University, which named its computer museum in her honor.

Betty Jean said: “Do what you love, because it’s not really work,” Her advises to girls are: “There are no stupid questions. Act as if you have permission to do things and don’t let anyone intimidates you.” Betty tells young women: “What I did seemed like play because it was fun; even though we were pushing back frontiers.”

For more information on the documentary, visit Invisible Computers: The Untold Story of the ENIAC Programmers.

Giovanna Garcia
Imperfect Action is better than No Action