Who is “Amazing Grace” Hopper, you ask? Only the coolest old broad in the history of computer science! She wrote the world’s first program compiler, pioneered “human readable” programming code, designed the first widely accepted programming language (COBOL), championed the concept of network computing (the internet’s grandpa), and coined the term “debugging” when she found a literal bug in her computer. Long story short, every computer programmer in the world (including me) owes their livelihood to Amazing Grace.

In addition to making my job possible, she served her country faithfully for decades! She volunteered for the U.S. Navy during WWII and kept at it until she was involuntarily forced to retire at the tender young age of 79.

I really do like this lady. Sadly, she died during my senior year in high school and I didn’t learn about her and her amazing life until after I had graduated college. What I would give for one of here “nanosecond” wires!

Rather than retell her whole story here, just go read her wiki page.

[Added bonus! Found this link on Twitter. Amazing Grace on the Letterman show.]