Mary Golda Ross

Mary Golda Ross (August 9, 1908 – April 29, 2008) was the first Native American female engineer. She was one of the 40 founding engineers of the Skunk Works, and was known for her work at Lockheed Martin on "preliminary design concepts for interplanetary space travel, manned and unmanned earth-orbiting flights, the earliest studies of orbiting satellites for both defense and civilian purposes."

biography

From Find A Grave Memorial # 32113706

Mary Golda "Gold" Ross passed away Tuesday April 29th at her home in Los Altos, California just 3 ½ months before her 100th birthday. An Native American aerospace engineer, Mary Golda Ross made notable contributions in aerospace technology, particularly in areas related to space flight and ballistic missiles.

Known outside the family as Mary ~ Gold, as she was know by the family, was part of the original engineering team at Lockheed's Missile Systems Division, where she worked on a number of defense systems, and contributed to space exploration efforts with her work relating to the Apollo program, the Polaris reentry vehicle, and interplanetary space probes.

Born in Oklahoma on August 9, 1908, Ross took pride in her heritage as a Cherokee Indian. Her great-great-grandfather, John Ross, was the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation between 1828 and 1866. Ross was later to remark that she had been brought up in the Cherokee tradition of equal education for both boys and girls. She was, however, the only girl in her math class, which did not seem to bother her. Indeed, her early interests were math, physics, and science.

Armed with these interests and a sense of purpose, Miss Ross graduated from high school when she was sixteen. She attended Northeastern State Teacher's College and graduated from there in 1928, when she was twenty. After graduating from Northeastern State Teachers College, Ross taught mathematics and science for nine and one-half years in public schools. She also served as a girls' advisor at a Pueblo and Navajo school for boys and girls. Ross returned to school herself, this time to Colorado State Teachers College (now the University of Northern Colorado at Greeley), where she graduated with a master's degree in mathematics in 1938.

With the growth of the aviation industry in the early part of World War II, Miss Ross found a position in 1942 as an assistant to a consulting mathematician with Lockheed Aircraft Corporation in Burbank, California. Her early work at Lockheed involved engineering problems having to do with transport and fighter aircraft. Meanwhile, with the support of Lockheed, Ross continued her education at the University of California, Los Angeles, where she took courses in aeronautical and mechanical engineering.

When Lockheed formed its Missiles Systems Division in 1954, it selected Mary Ross to be one of the first forty employees, and she was the only female engineer among them. As the American missile program matured, Miss Ross found herself researching and evaluating feasibility and performance of ballistic missile and other defense systems. She also studied the distribution of pressure caused by ocean waves and how it affected submarine-launched vehicles.

Her work in 1958 concentrated on satellite orbits and the Agena series of rockets that played so prominent a role in the Apollo moon program during the 1960s and 70s. As an advanced systems engineer, Miss Ross worked on the Polaris reentry vehicle and engineering systems for manned space flights. Before her retirement from Lockheed in 1973, Ross undertook research on flyby space probes that would study Mars and Venus. After Ross retired she continued her interests in engineering by delivering lectures to high school and college groups to encourage young women and Native American youths to train for technical careers.

Ross authored a number of classified publications relating to her work in national defense and received several awards during her career. A charter member of the Los Angeles chapter of the Society of Women Engineers since 1952, Ross has received a number of honors. In 1961 she garnered the San Francisco Examiner's award for Woman of Distinction and the Woman of Achievement Award from the California State Federation of Business and Professional Clubs. Ross was elected a fellow and life member of the Society of Women Engineers, whose Santa Clara Valley Section established a scholarship in her name. She has also been the recipient of achievement awards from the American Indian Science and Engineering Society and from the Council of Energy Resource Tribes. In 1992 she was inducted into the Silicon Valley Engineering Hall of Fame.

Among her many awards, she was selected as Outstanding Alumnus where she received her Bachelor's Degree in Oklahoma 1994 and where she received her Master's Degree in Colorado in 1992. In addition to this she was a very strong supporter, both financial and vocal, for AISES (American Indians in Science and Engineering Society)

Gold leaves behind to cherish and keep her memory alive: a sister, Billie Ross Meyer of Middletown, New York; two first cousins John Ross Piburn of Denton, Texas and R. Bruce Ross, IV of Scottsdale, Arizona; plus countless nieces, nephews, cousins and loved ones throughout the Cherokee Nation and the world. We can only look to the stars and say,

"Thank you, Gold, for your lifetime of contributions to mankind."

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• Wikipedia: Mary G. Ross; "Hidden Figure" Cherokee woman helped NASA put man on the moon; Mary G. Ross – Native American Heritage Month 2015; Women's History Month 2013,Celebrating the First Native American Female Engineer 2013

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• Reference: Ancestry Genealogy - SmartCopy: Mar 3 2017, 2:33:14 UTC
• Reference: Ancestry Genealogy - SmartCopy: Mar 3 2017, 5:56:08 UTC

https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/mary-ross-hidden-figure/