Ada Lovelace

Ada Lovelace’s imagination is one that could never be tamed. When she was younger, she wanted to fly, so she studied patterns of birds and objects that could be manipulated to allow her to fly. While this behavior was seen as juvenile and a waste of time by her mother, Annabella Byron, Lovelace’s restless imagination failed to cease. Lovelace states, "Imagination is the Discovering Faculty, pre-eminently. It is that which penetrates into the unseen worlds around us, the worlds of Science."

Annabella Byron insisted on Ada engaging in rigorous studies, specifically science and mathematics, despite its rarity for women at the time. This insistence was in an effort to prevent Lovelace from becoming like her father, Romantic Poet Lord Byron.  Her father and mother divorced just two months after her birth, leaving her with a disconnected relationship with her father. She was educated by mathematician-logician Augustus De Morgan, who was the first professor of mathematics at the University of London. 

Almost instantaneously, from the moment she was introduced to Charles Babbage, the father of the computer, at around the age of 17, she grew increasingly fascinated with his analytical engines. In 1843, she translated Italian mathematician Menabrea’s “Elements of Charles Babbage’s Analytical Machine.” In addition to a translation, Ada Lovelace included her own annotations and ideas on the machine, which ended up being three times as long as the original article. In a mergence of both the poetic and analytical sides of her brain, Lovelace beautifully articulates, "The Analytical engine weaves algebraic patterns, just as the Jacquard-loom weaves flowers and leaves." Through her annotations, Ada Lovelace introduced computer concepts such as what we now know as looping, earning her the title “the first computer programmer.” 

In her later days, Lovelace attempts to use mathematics to gain an advantage in gambling, but ultimately fails and ends up in financial demise. 

Today, she is honored every second Tuesday of October on Ada Lovelace Day in remembrance of the contributions women have made to STEM. Additionally, the programming language Ada was named after Ada Lovelace.