The Real Pocahontas

 

Pocahontas has been a legend of American culture for generations – the subject of romantic novels, documentaries, and Disney films. After so much fanfare, it can be difficult to separate the myth from the historic figure. Here, we’ll try to do that.

First of all, her name was not Pocahontas. Born in 1596, her real name was Amonute and sometimes Matoaka. Pocahontas was a nickname, which in Algonquin means “playful one” or “misbehaving child.”

Legend says Pocahontas fell in love with John Smith, an English settler at Jonestown who was captured by chief Powhatan her father. The two shared a secret love affair that they had to keep hidden from the Algonquins.

In actuality, there was probably little romance between the two. Pocahontas was twelve when she met John Smith and their only recorded interaction was a time when she helped Smith learn portions of the Algonquin language during his captivity.

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After his imprisonment, John Smith was sentenced to death. As the tribesmen placed his head on a stone for execution, Pocahontas intervened, pleading with her father to let her lover go.

In all likelihood, John Smith did not face execution that day. Algonquins often placed people’s heads on stones for religious rituals. It is not unlikely that John Smith was being anointed before his planned release later that day.

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Powhatan dispatched of John Smith and Pocahontas saw mournfully to her lovers’ departure – a bittersweet romance that gave her a new appreciation of how two peoples can live in harmony.

Records show that Pocahontas’ true love was actually John Rolfe, a man she married in 1614 after her own captivity among European colonists following the First Anglo-Powhatan War. Pocahontas converted to Christianity and was baptized with the name “Rebecca.” She lived among Europeans until her death on a ship bound for Virginia in 1617.

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The Women of Coding

In 1833, Lady Ada Lovelace, the only legitimate daughter of Lord Byron, became the first computer programmer when she created a machine for computing called the Analytical Engine. Her partner, Charles Babbage, designed the hardware, while Lovelace focused on the machine’s inner workings or what we now call “software.” Bringing the machine to its absolute limit, Lovelace published the first computer algorithm in 1843.

Lovelace’s legacy would continue into the 20th century, as women entered the workforce. While men were busy fighting WWII, a group of female computer scientists, including Betty Holberton, Kay McNulty, Marlyn Wescoff, Ruth Lichterman, Fran Bilas and Betty Jean Jennings programmed the ENIAC, one of the first general purpose computers. Although they were called “subprofessionals” by their peers and “refrigerator girls” by historians, Hoberton and her team used ENIAC to make crucial calculations on the trajectory of ballistic missiles for the US and its allies.

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The military would give rise to another great coder when Grace Hopper, a professor and computer scientist, joined the navy reserve and developed one of the earliest programming languages, COBOL. Hopper went on to create the first compiler, a device for synthesizing written language into code. By the end of her career, she had risen to the rank of rear admiral and even got a US destroyer named after her.

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In the 1980’s women’s participation in coding suddenly dropped. While the reason is unknown, Sara Kiesler, a social scientist, believes the advent of personal computers was chiefly responsible. Kielfer argues that when computers entered the home, parents made them the domain of boys and not girls. The culture surrounding tech became male-dominated and many women decided to opt out of the field completely. Female participation in programming was cut in half, and today only 18 percent of computer science graduates are women.

If you have a daughter or niece this Women’s History Month, encourage their interest in computers! Tell them that a career in coding is a girl thing too and that they can make history!

Click the link above to see more great female programmers and check out our storefront for great science gifts.

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• nytimes.com
• history.com