Lack of Role Models
Education for 19th century English women, especially the lower class, was virtually non-existent. The conviction that women were intellectually incompetent was pervasive.
"At the time, nobody was particularly excited about women getting engaged in higher intellectual pursuits because you know 'their poor frail brains! ' What would happen? They might just overheat!" [6] |
Mary Somerville, Lovelace's mathematics mentor, was one of few women of the time to become an influential scientist. Despite her success, she was often urged by friends and family to "stop learning."
"I was annoyed that my turn for reading was so much disapproved, and thought it unjust to give women a desire for knowledge if it were wrong to acquire it. The only thing in which I was determined and inflexible was in the prosecution of my studies; they were perpetually interrupted but resolutely resumed at the first opportunity." -Mary Somerville, "The Queen of 19th Century Science" [8] |
Intellectual women, including Lovelace and Somerville, had to encounter this discouraging social atmosphere with persevering resistance if they intended to have a successful career.
Lovelace's Early Influences
When Lovelace's parents separated, Lady Byron vowed to keep Lovelace from her notorious father's poetic irrationality, so Lady Byron pressured grammar and arithmetic onto her daughter.
"Her mother... bucked the general trend of society, and Ada Lovelace would not [have been] possible without [her]... Her mother gave her all of this mathematical education..."-Valerie Aurora, co-founder of the Ada Initiative, a non-profit organization, during student phone interview [9]
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Transcript Time Length 1:28. Engineering & Technology 2010 [10]
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Drawing from the romantic and logical ideologies of her father and mother respectively, Lovelace explored the intersection of exchange between the artistic and mathematical capabilities of the Analytical Engine, a Babbage-designed computing machine.
Pursuing Mathematics
Though Lady Byron approved of Lovelace's mathematics interest, Victorian England staunchly objected. Augustus de Morgan, Lovelace's mathematics mentor, even worried her health would deteriorate because the "very great tension of mind which [math problems] require [was] beyond the strength of a woman's physical power of application." [17]
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However,"[Lovelace] was part of the aristocracy, and so, she had a great deal more freedom and money to do things, [have] introductions to people, and... move in society... to contribute in a way that the vast, vast majority of women weren't able to do at that time."- Michael Merrifield, cosmological theoretical physicist [11]
Lovelace--despite encountering discouragement from some friends and family-- sought mentors, pursued her studies, and later published the first computer program, serving as a role model for women in STEM a century later.
"She just loved, loved, science [and] and loved talking to other people about science, loved figuring things out. That's the thing about her and Babbage [a future academic partner]. She really enjoyed getting to talk to somebody about science, so she had a lot of relationships with other mathematicians and scientists." -Valerie Aurora, co-founder of the Ada Initiative, a non-profit organization, during student phone interview [9] |