Barbara Paulson, Human Computer & Rocket Girl
Barbara Jean Paulson was born on April 11, 1928 in Columbus, Ohio, and she lived with her mother, younger brother, and two older sisters. Barbara studied Latin and Maths for four years in high school and took a completely different path from her sisters, who were both secretaries and suggested Barbara do the same. However, she was interested in maths and majored in the subject at Ohio State University before moving to where her sisters lived in California, which led her to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at NASA.
She joined the team in 1948 when calculations were still done manually, and it took her days on end just to work with the numbers behind a rocket path, but she persisted. Later, Paulson was tasked with the role of plotting data, which was received from satellites and networking stations. The JPL was where she met her friends who would soon become the famous Rocket Girls, the group of women who sent the U.S. to space. Helen Ling was one of Barbara’s closest friends, and she was the only girl who majored in maths in the University of Notre Dame, reflecting the lack of women in the field at the time.
During the 1950s, what we now know as ‘computers’ were becoming more popular in workplaces such as the JPL, but people saw them as untrustworthy. Men believed operating computers was a woman’s work as it seemed similar to an office job. Thus, Barbara and the Rocket Girls took over these jobs, making them the first-ever team of computer programmers. Using the IBMs given to them, the group of women learned how to code. The Rocket girls became so attached to the IBM 1620, they named her CORA and gave her a designated space in the office.
Their first great achievement as a team was when they charted the course that sent Explorer 1 to space on January 31, 1958. In just 3 months, the whole team at JPL were able to create this satellite and send it into Earth’s orbit. Even though all the calculations for the first U.S. satellite were done by this group of astonishing women, they were not given as much credit as they deserved. Even now, the NASA website only states the name of the 3 men who were part of the project with no mention of the Rocket Girls.
Barbara married and subsequently became pregnant in 1960, and her higher-ups forced her to quit even though she was in the position of supervisor at the time. Luckily for her, she was invited back with welcoming arms less than a year after she gave birth by this group of women who not only prioritised their work but also the sisterhood between them.
As time goes on, machines like these first computers become more advanced, eliminating the need for such manual calculations. However, the Rocket Girls learned how to code and developed new skills as computer engineers to adapt to these changes, and they worked on other influential projects such as the 100th Corporal Rocket, which they signed all of their names on with Sharpie pen.
Barbara Paulson went on to work on various other projects at NASA such as the Vikings 1 and 2, Voyagers 1 and 2, and Mariner Probes, mainly as a rocket trajectory calculator. All of these famous launches were successful. Paulson and the Rocket Girls opened new doors for women in the STEM fields and left legacies as admirable mathematicians and some of the world’s first computer programmers.
by Ha Nguyen
References
Holland, Brynn. “Human Computers: The Women of NASA.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 13 Dec. 2016, www.history.com/news/human-computers-women-at-nasa
NPR Staff. “Meet The ‘Rocket Girls,’ The Women Who Charted The Course To Space.” NPR, 5 Apr. 2016, www.npr.org/2016/04/05/473099967/meet-the-rocket-girls-the-women-who-charted-the-course-to-space
“NASA’s First Computers Were Women With Pencils.” Wbur. 13 Apr. 2016, https://www.wbur.org/radioboston/2016/04/13/nasa-computers-women
WHO 13 Digital Staff. “Meet Barbara Paulson, Iowa’s Rocket Girl.” WHO 13, NextStar Inc., 27 Feb, 2017, https://who13.com/news/meet-barbara-paulson-iowas-rocket-girl/
Mohaupt, Hillary. “Ladies Who Launch.” Science History Institute, 14 Aug. 2017, https://www.sciencehistory.org/distillations/ladies-who-launch
Conway, Erik. “Women Made Early Inroads at JPL.” Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 27 March 2007, https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=1327
Light, Jennifer. “Space science: the women who launched NASA.” Nature, 06 Apr. 2016, https://www.nature.com/articles/532034a
Loff, Sarah. “Explorer 1 Overview. NASA.” NASA, 04 Aug. 2017, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/explorer/explorer-overview.html
