Ada Lovelace, a mathematician and pioneering computer programmer, was born as the only legitimate child of the poet Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) and Anne Isabella Milbanke. Her parents’ marriage was unhappy, and Byron separated from his wife just a month after Ada’s birth.
As a child, Ada was often sickly, but her mother strongly encouraged her studies, particularly in mathematics. She was privately educated and, during her youth, met many prominent scientists, including Michael Faraday, Andrew Crosse, and Charles Wheatstone. At the age of eighteen, Ada was introduced to the British mathematician Charles Babbage at one of his Saturday night soirées, which she attended with her mother. Despite being twenty years her senior, Babbage developed a lifelong friendship with Ada.
Babbage, known as ‘the father of computers’, inspired Ada’s interest in his work on the Analytical Engine. In 1842, she devised an elaborate set of instructions—later called Notes—that are recognised as the first algorithms intended for execution by a machine. Ada foresaw that computers could go beyond mere number crunching, envisioning their potential for more complex tasks. In honour of her groundbreaking contributions, the programming language Ada was named after her in 1980.
In 1835, Ada married William, 8th Baron King, and the couple had three children. Despite her domestic responsibilities, she maintained her passion for mathematics, mesmerism, and phrenology (a pseudoscience that studies the shape of the skull in order to indicate mental faculties and traits of character). She even sought to create a mathematical model to explain how the brain generates thoughts and feelings, though this goal remained unfulfilled. Later, when Babbage gave a lecture in French at the University of Turin on the Analytical Engine, Ada was commissioned to translate the transcript into English. Her translation was exceptionally thorough, including detailed notes and explanations. These additions are considered the first published algorithm.
Ada died young, at the age of 36, on November 27, 1852, from uterine cancer. Toward the end of her life, her mother exerted control over her, isolating her from friends and confidants. Despite Ada’s lack of a relationship with her father, she was buried next to him in the family vault at the Church of St. Magdalen in Hucknall, Nottinghamshire.
As one of the earliest to recognise the potential of programmable machines, Ada Lovelace holds a prominent place in the history of computing. Her visionary thinking, combined with her analytical skills, made her a trailblazer for women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics). Since 2009, on the second Tuesday in October, Ada Lovelace Day is celebrated for all women making strides in science and technology.