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Grace Hopper was born In New York, New York
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earned a PhD in math from Yale -- a rare accomplishment for anyone at the time. Only 1,279 math PhDs were awarded in the 72-year period from 1862-1934, the year Hopper received hers.
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After the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the United States’ entry into World War II, Hopper decided to join the war effort. She was initially rejected because of her age and diminutive size, but she persisted and eventually received a waiver to join the U.S. Naval Reserve (Women’s Reserve).
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was assigned to the Bureau of Ordnance’s Computation Project at Harvard University (1944), where she worked on Mark I, the first large-scale automatic calculator and a precursor of electronic computers.
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she designed an improved compiler, which translated a programmer’s instructions into computer codes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3PjvadIlXE
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Hopper proposed the idea of writing programs in words, rather than symbols, but she was told her idea would not work
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In 1957 her division developed Flow-Matic, the first English-language data-processing compiler.
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Hopper is widely recognized for her work designing COBOL, developing compilers for it, and encouraging its broad adoption.
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She retired from the navy with the rank of commander in 1966
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awarded to outstanding alumni and their contributions to society.
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She would remain with the Navy for 19 years after she initially retired. When she retired officially in 1986, at age 79, she was a rear admiral as well as the oldest serving officer in the service.
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Grace Hopper became the first female individual recipient of the National Medal of Technology.
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She worked all the way up to her death. Hopper was buried with full military honors in Arlington National Cemetery
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In 2016, Hopper posthumously received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, in recognition of her “lifelong leadership role in the field of computer science.”
