Breaking Barriers to the Moon and Back:
How Margaret Hamilton's Software Sent
Men to the Moon
As a Student
Hamilton grew up in Paoli, Indiana and loved math. At Earlham College, she majored in mathematics and minored in philosophy. She was often the only woman in her math and physics classes, but she had a female math professor, Florence Long, who inspired Hamilton to continue studying math.
Earlham College Seal. Earlham College . No date.
Margaret Hamilton as a child. Makers. No date.
“When I attended high school and college, software engineering was not yet a field and there were therefore no classes in programming, i.e., ‘software engineering,’ to attend.”
-Margaret Hamilton
As the USSR shot ahead in the space race, Americans sought to strengthen STEM education. On September 2, 1958, Congress passed the National Defense Education Act, which funded better science and math education. Just months out of college, Hamilton didn’t benefit directly, but America’s focus on national defense and the space race soon opened new doors career-wise.