Margaret Hamilton: Lead Software Engineer on the Apollo Project

People forget that women were very much involved in software in the 1960s. Meet Margaret Hamilton: The Woman Behind the Apollo Project.

Hamilton was born in 1936, and received a B.A. in math from Earlham College. She taught herself to program before becoming the director of the Software Engineering Division of the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory, which developed software for the NASA Apollo programs.

The photo is of Hamilton standing next to a printout of the Apollo Guidance Computer program. The photo was taken for the Apollo 11 mission. Clicking on the image will take you to the NASA site that commemorates her receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2016.

The very first contract NASA issued for the Apollo program (in August 1961) was with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to develop the guidance and navigation system for the Apollo spacecraft. Hamilton, a computer programmer, would wind up leading the Software Engineering Division of the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory (now Draper Labs). Computer science, as we now know it, was just coming into existence at the time. Hamilton led the team that developed the building blocks of software engineering – a term that she coined herself. Her systems approach to the Apollo software development and insistence on rigorous testing was critical to the success of Apollo. As she noted, “There was no second chance. We all knew that.”

And that code reflects the personality of designers. The routine that controls Master Ignition for the Command Module is headed by a comment that says…

BURN. BABY. BURN. — MASTER IGNITION ROUTINE

If you’re confused on how women got pushed out of computing, you aren’t alone. How Women Were Pushed Out of the Tech Industry.

Every Human Ever (Except Michael Collins)

50 years ago today, a most iconic image was taken, just before the lunar lander docked with the command module of Apollo 11. (The photo was taken at 21:34:00 UT or 5:34 PM EDT, 1969)

Michael Collins, the astronaut who took this photo, is the only human, alive or dead that isn’t in the frame of this picture, 1969

For the Large Scale version of the photo, click this link. And for all of the Apollo 11 photos, see this link at NASA.

The Eagle Has Landed

Since everyone is celebrating/remembering Apollo 11… The date the Lunar Lander touched down was August 20th, 1969. The time was 20:17:40 UTC (or 4:17 PM EDT for those of you confused by universal coordinated time, or Zulu time).

They managed to land the Eagle and shut the engines down with about 20 seconds of fuel reserve left. This video is the last 40 seconds of the descent.

Apollo 11 Launch Footage (July 16, 1969)

The 50th Anniversary of Apollo 11. 2 videos and some info on the Saturn V. (Shamelessly stolen from myself from last-year’s post.)

The launch of Apollo 11 took place on July 16, 1969 at 13:32 UTC. (That is 9:32 AM Eastern Daylight Time in case you’re confused.) For those of you who don’t remember, it was the first Apollo mission to land men on the moon.

This is Saturn V launch-pad footage from that day. 16mm film at 500 frames per second. 8 minutes plus worth of video is only about 30 seconds of real time. I think it is fairly interesting.

I love that video because there is expert commentary, but not everyone agrees with me. So here’s a video that is a compilation of views from various cameras, including the control room, and the audience on site at Cape Canaveral. (The cover photo is the same for both videos, but I assure you that they are different.) YT will complain if you have the browser privacy settings set to 11, so use the link. (You don’t have privacy set to 11?)

Some stats on the Saturn V:

• Produced thrust of 34.5 million newtons (7.6 million pounds)
• Fueled weight 2.8 million kilograms (6.2 million pounds)
• Height of 111 meters (363 feet)

Apollo 11

In all the brouhaha over the current science-fiction movie, very little has been said about the documentary about the actual space program. I have to say it looks great. It is playing at a theater not too far from me, so I may go see it, before it disappears.

Apollo 11 Launch Footage (July 16, 1969)

The launch of Apollo 11 took place on July 16, 1969. For those of you who don’t remember, it was the first Apollo mission to land men on the moon.

This is Saturn V launch-pad footage from that day. 16mm film at 500 frames per second. 8 minutes plus is about 30 seconds of real time. I think it is fairly interesting.

I love that video because there is expert commentary, but not everyone agrees with me. So here’s a link to a video that is a compilation of views from various cameras, including the control room, and the audience on site at Cape Canaveral.

Some stats on the Saturn V:

• Produced thrust of 34.5 million newtons (7.6 million pounds)
• Fueled weight 2.8 million kilograms (6.2 million pounds)
• Height of 111 meters (363 feet)