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GRACE MURRAY HOPPER
1 906-1 992
WRITTEN BY GORDON R. NAGLER
SUBMITTED BY THE NAE HOME SECRETARY
REAR ADMIRAL GRACE MURRAY HOPPER USNR (retired), a
legend in her own time, died January 1,1992, at the age of eighty-
five. She was buried at Arlington National Cemetery with full
military honors, as befitted an individual who believed that
having the privilege and responsibility to serve her country as a
naval officer was the highest possible honor she could receive.
Grace Brewster Murray was born on December 9, 1906, in
New York, New York. (She claimed as her second home town,
Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, which she first visited in the sum-
mer of 1907.) Her parents always encouraged her insatiable
curiosity. In 192S, a time when most young women who gradu-
ated from college became school teachers, Grace graduated
from Vassar College, Phi Beta Kappa, with degrees in mathemat-
ics and physics and a Vassar College fellowship. In 1930 she
married Vincent Foster Hopper. They had no children and were
divorced in 1945.
From Yale University she received an M.A. in 1930 and a Ph.D.
in 1934, together with election to Sigma Xi and two Sterling
Scholarships. She returned to Vassar as a mathematics assistant
in 1931, and she successively became an instructor, assistant
professor, and associate professor. She received a Vassar faculty
fellowship and studied at New York University in 1941-1942, and
the following year became an assistant professor of mathematics
at Barnard College.
79
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
In 1944 she started her long love affair with the United States
Navywhen she was commissioned a lieutenant (junior grade) in
the U.S. Naval Reserve. She was ordered to the Bureau of
Orcinance Computation Project at Harvard University. It was
here that she met her "destiny" and commenced work on the first
large digital computer, the Mark I. She was very proud of the fact
that she was the world's third programmer, or "coder" as they
were then called. In 1946 she left active duty in the U.S. Naval
Reserve because she was "too old" to apply for the regular Navy,
at age forty!
She joined the Harvard faculty as a research fellow in engi-
neering sciences and applied physics in 1946, when the Compu-
tation Laboratory was working on the Mark II ant} Mark III
computers.
In 1949 the fledgling corporation of Eckert-Mauchly Comput-
ers was involved with building the first UNIVAC, and Grace
joined as a senior mathematician. She remained with that
corporation and its successors, Remington Ran cl and Sperry
Corporation, until she retired in 1971.
In 1966 Commancler Hopper retired from the U.S. Naval
Reserve, having reached the age of sixty. Within the year she was
recalled from her company to active duty to help impose a
standarcl on the U.S. Navy's many computer languages. Because
of her retired reserve status, she was not eligible for promotion,
and the chief of the Bureau of Naval Personnel could only
extend her active duty one year at a time. On August 2, 1973,
through a special act of Congress, she was promoted to captain,
USNR (retired). When Admiral Rickover left active dutyin 1982,
she became the oldest naval officer serving on active cluty. She
constantly noted this distinction with pride. Through the inter-
vention of John Lehman, then secretary of the navy, President
Reagan made a special presidential appointment of Grace to
commodore on November 8, 1983. (The rank of commodore
was changed back to the title of rear admiral in l9X5. ) At the age
of seventy-nine she retired from active (luty for the last time on
August ~ 4, ~ 986, on board the USS Constitution- the oldest naval
officer on active duty aboard the oldest warship in commission.
During her clistinguished navy career she received numerous
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GRACE MURRAY HOPPER
81
honors, citations, and awards, including the Navy Distinguished
Service Medal and the Legion of Merit.
Immediately upon her retirement from the U.S. Navy, she
went to work for Digital Equipment Corporation as a senior
consultant and was an active participant until she died.
Grace Hopper was known for many achievements. In fact,
Charles H. Doersam, Jr., a member of an early small group of
computer people, circa 1950, reported that Grace, the only
woman in this group, once caused quite a stir when she rose to
a podium and declared, "I've been coming to these meetings for
some time now and listening to all of you men tell me about your
fine hardware, and I think it's about time I tell you about my
'software."' This was an early use of the term "software," now an
integral part of our daily lexicon. This example typifies Grace
Hopper she told you what she believed, whether you were
ready to hear it or not.
One of the few areas in which she would accept any credit was
the work she did on the development ofthe first compiler. In May
1953 her paper "Compiling Routines" described some of the
fundamental ideas of compiling, as contrasted with interpreting.
A computer program known as a compiler translates instructions
written in a programming language into machine language that
the computer can understand and use. Without this concept
computers never would have attained today's broad use.
This led to Grace's involvement with COBOL Common
Business-Oriented Language. As Jean Sammet has documented
in her article "Farewell to Grace Hopper End of an Era!"
published in Communications of the ACM, April 1992, Grace was
one of six people who recommended in April 1959 that the
Department of Defense convene a meeting to consider the
development of specifications for a common business language.
From this meeting came the Committee on Data Systems Lan-
guages (CODASYL) executive committee. Grace was one of its
two technical advisers. The committee that developed COBOL
-
operated under the aegis of the CODASYL executive committee.
Her main contribution, however, is the legacy of her initial work
on FLOW-MATIC, which was a major input to COBOL.
An area where she truly excellecI, and was most proud of, was
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
her interaction with young people, whether at work or giving
speeches at symposia and colleges. Young people referred to her
in a reverent way as "Amazing Grace. " She was constantly telling
them that the phrase she disliked the most was, "We have always
done it that way." She would tell young people, "Go ahead and
do it. You can always apologize later if need be. " As she often said,
the most important thing that she had accomplished in life was
the training of young people. Another of her favorite sayings,
en c! she had many, was "We manage things. We lead people."
How fortunate we are that she dedicated so much of her time and
energies to young people.
There were many things that set Grace apart from the average
person. For example, many of us were lucky enough to receive
one of her "nanoseconds," a piece of wire 11.38 inches long. In
speeches and travels she would explain her early frustrations of
not being able to comprehend a milli-, micro-, and nanosecond.
Having never "seen one," she wouIcl explain that she did not
knowwhen itwas over. Since electromagnetic radiation travels in
space at the speed of light, one thousandth of a second repre-
sents just over 186 miles. Grace would then hand out her 1 1.38
inches of wire so you could "see" a nanosecond, one billionth of
a second. Then she would explain the problem we faced in
computers was the need to compute and operate faster. She was
always effective in reaching her audience.
Most people who worked with Grace were familiar with some
of the stories attributed to her. She user] to start many of her out-
of-town speeches with an account of how someone mistook her
for an airport security guard as she walked through the local
airport. Another story attributed to her was the origin of the
phrase "computer bug." One night in 1945, supposedly, she and
several others were having problems with the Mark I computer
(which was fifty-one feet long). Someone looked inside and
pulled out a two-inch moth that had become wedged inside.
After that, whenever there was a problem with the computer, the
group would say, "another bug has gotten inside."
Everyone who was ever associated with Grace knew about her
famous office clock. To disprove that there was only one way to
do things, she had a clock that ran counterclockwise- and kept
perfect time.
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In 1983 Grace was featured on the television show "60 Min-
utes." She once again proved that a "computer whiz" could be a
normal, bright, interesting person, not a stodgy desk-bound
individual who had no other interest than manipulating a
computer. In fact, she was so popular on the show that her
segment was repeated in 1986 after her navy retirement.
One facet of Grace's life that is not as well known was her
generous support of the Navy Relief Society, which is dedicated
to helping individuals in the Navy familywho are in need. In 1982
the U.S. Navy magazine All Hands featured an article on Grace
titled "Grace Hopper A Living Legend." To the best of my
knowledge, this article publicized this support for the first time,
as follows: "Grace Hopper, an extraordinary woman, seeks no
honors or awards for her work. She prefers to give freely of her
tremendous energy and talents. As of June 1982, for example,
she had contributed more than $34,000 to the Navy Relief
Society from honorariums she had received for numerous speak-
ing engagements over the years." (From 1973 until her death,
Grace donated $] 14,295 to the Navy Relief Society.) The above
excerpt from the All Hands article described Grace as well as
anyone can. She was truly a remarkable woman.
Admiral Hopper was elected a member of the National Acad-
emy of Engineering in 1973. She also belonged to at least thirty-
five other societies and associations. She was the author or
coauthor of numerous reports, articles, and a book, Understand-
ing Computers, with Steven L. Mandell, West Publishing Com-
pany, 1984.
Honors and awards ranged from Phi Beta Kappa in 1928 to the
National Medal of Technology awarded to her by President Bush
in 1991, the first woman individually recognized with this pres-
tigious award. In between were more than thirty-five honorary
doctoral degrees from various universities and numerous awards
from organizations worldwide.
Admiral Grace Murray Hopper was truly an individual who
will be remembered in history for her many accomplishments in
the field of computers. Most important, she touched and influ-
enced many lives. For this we are all thankful.
She managed things. She led people.
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grace murray
