Elsie Shutt
{{short description|American computer programmer and entrepreneur (born 1928)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Elsie Shutt
| birth_name = Elsie Goedeke
| birth_date = {{birth year and age|1928}}
| birth_place = New York City, United States
| education = Goucher College (BA)
| occupation = {{hlist|Technology entrepreneur}}
}}
Elsie Shutt (née Goedeke, born 1928) is an American technology entrepreneur. She founded Computations Incorporated (CompInc.) in 1958. She was among the first women to establish a software business in the United States.{{Cite news |title=Episode 576: When Women Stopped Coding |url=https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/17/356944145/episode-576-when-women-stopped-coding |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180809120317/https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/10/17/356944145/episode-576-when-women-stopped-coding |archive-date=2018-08-09 |access-date=2018-08-12 |work=NPR.org |language=en}}{{cite book |author=Janet Abbate |url=https://archive.org/details/recodinggenderwo0000abba |title=Recoding Gender: Women's Changing Participation in Computing |publisher=MIT Press |year=2012 |isbn=978-0-262-01806-7 |author-link=Janet Abbate |url-access=registration}}{{cite web|author=Janet Abbate|url=http://theweek.com/articles/442965/women-who-shaped-computer-age|title=The women who shaped the computer age|date=21 October 2014|website=Theweek.com}}
Early life and education
Elsie Shutt was born Elsie Goedeke in New York City. She was raised in Baltimore, Maryland by her mother and maternal grandfather. Her father died when she was four years old.
She attended Eastern High School in Baltimore and graduated at the age of 16. At the age of 20, she graduated from Goucher College as a math major with a minor in chemistry. After receiving a Pepsi-Cola fellowship for graduate school, covering full tuition and partial living expenses, she continued her math studies at Radcliffe College.
Career
Shutt learnt to program on the Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer (ENIAC) under Dick Clippinger during a summer job at the U.S. Army's Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/13/magazine/women-coding-computer-programming.html|title=The Secret History of Women in Coding|first=Clive|last=Thompson|date=13 February 2019|access-date=18 February 2019|website=The New York Times}} In 1953, Shutt was hired at Raytheon, an aerospace and defense manufacturing company, where she worked on software for the Raycom computer.{{cite web|url=http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2573&context=cmc_theses|date=2017|title=A New Frontier: But for Whom? An Analysis of the Micro-Computer and Women's Declining Participation in Computer Science|author=Eliana Keinan|website=Scholarship.claremont.edu|access-date=18 February 2019}}
In 1957, Shutt married and had a baby.{{cite web |last1=May |first1=Eira Long |date=7 March 2019 |title=Women's Work: An Interview with Clive Thompson on the Secret History of Women in Coding |url=https://www.jamasoftware.com/blog/interview-womens-work-clive-thompson-on-the-secret-history-of-women-in-coding/ |access-date=20 January 2025 |website=Jama Software}} She subsequently left her job. She worked as a freelance programmer from her home, and in 1958 she founded Computations Incorporated.
Shutt's founding of Computations Incorporated (CompInc) was a development for gender equality in computer science–a historically male-dominated field. According to Janet Abbate, author of Recoding Gender: Women's Changing Participation in Computing, Shutt was among the early pioneers who showed that women could work in programming and systems analysis while also managing family responsibilities.
CompInc created software solutions for major clients such as Raytheon and the U.S. Air Force.{{Cite web |title=Recoding Gender |url=https://mitpress.mit.edu/9780262534536/recoding-gender/ |access-date=2024-09-17 |website=MIT Press |language=en-US}}{{cite web |title=Oral-History:Elsie Shutt - Engineering and Technology History Wiki |url=https://ethw.org/Oral-History:Elsie_Shutt |access-date=18 February 2019 |website=Ethw.org}}{{Cite journal |date=March 1963 |title=Mixing Math and Motherhood |journal=Business Week |pages=86–87}} Shutt led CompInc for more than 45 years. She frequently employed women who sought flexible programming jobs to balance family responsibilities. CompInc also offered additional training programs to employees with limited experience. The company provided systems analysis and design, along with programming help, for primary clients.
CompInc emphasized “desk-checking” between employees, during which they reviewed each other's code. At its peak, the company entered into contracts with Minneapolis-Honeywell, Raytheon, [https://www.tidewaternews.com/2014/06/07/remembering-the-st-regis-paper-company/ St. Regis Paper Co.], Harvard University, The University of Rochester, and the United States Air Force.{{cite book|author=Betty Friedan|title=It Changed My Life: Writings on the Women's Movement|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=iv4-Qy82BJ0C&pg=PA46|year=1998|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-46885-6|page=46}}
Shutt later commented that “It really amazed me that these men were programmers, because I thought it was women’s work!”.{{Cite web |last=Bindi |first=Tasnuva |date=2015-02-24 |title=Women didn't just recently start coding, they actually STOPPED coding decades ago |url=https://www.startupdaily.net/advice/women-didnt-just-recently-start-coding-actually-stopped-coding-decades-ago/ |access-date=2025-03-25 |website=Startup Daily |language=en-US}}
References
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Category:American computer programmers
Category:American women business executives
Category:American business executives
Category:Goucher College alumni
Category:Businesspeople from New York City
Category:Businesspeople from Baltimore