First female business computer programmer dies

Mary Clare Coombs, née Blood, born 4 February 1929, has died next issues arising after a Covid-19 infection.

Combs at first joined Lyons & Co in 1952 as a administration trainee, subsequent a holiday break task organized for her by her father, the company’s senior health care health care provider. Initially, she was place to get the job done in the company’s statistical business functioning a calculating device, but was before long made available the chance to join the Lyons Electronic Business office (LEO) staff, composing plans for the world’s 1st small business computer.

Recalling her knowledge of functioning on the LEO, Coombs explained: “We were all engaged in a large adventure.” She joined the computing group when there had been just a few programmers on board – all men – turning out to be the only lady in a course of 12 on an introductory computer appreciation study course. From there, it was straight into payroll applications for a swiftly rising vary of exterior consumers, as perfectly as building packages for inside firm use.

It was a large challenge. Not only had significantly of the do the job never ever been carried out prior to, she reported it also concerned operating on a notoriously unreliable valve computer that experienced just 2 KB of personal computer storage in comparison with the lots of gigabytes accessible to today’s programmers.

“When it was LEO 1, you experienced to know a lot about the equipment itself since there was so very little storage place that just about every instruction experienced to be critical, or it had to be knocked out,” she claimed.

Together with programming the LEO, she also worked as a programmer, managing payroll at providers these types of as Ford Motor Corporation, and was associated in a selection of work which include tax tables for the Inland Earnings, Fulfilled Place of work get the job done and the calculation of ballistics for the Army. She went on to turn into a supervisor and worked to identify and mend coding errors in the applications developed by others.

Spouse and children commitments intended that she ceased complete-time programming in 1964, but continued to perform aspect-time enhancing computer system manuals, and for a several months ran a computer system programming course for severely disabled inhabitants at the Princess Marina Centre, Seer Inexperienced, sponsored jointly by ICL and Buckinghamshire County Council.

It was not right until late 1969 that she finished her formal relationship with the LEO staff. 

Coombs returned to entire-time employment in September 1973 as a principal college teacher, finishing a three-12 months postgraduate training course in 1976. She retired from instructing in 1985 and went on to operate as a customer in the water treatment method field.

In 1955, she married John Coombs, himself briefly a personal computer programmer on the LEO workforce, who died in 2012. Alongside one another they experienced a daughter, Anne, who died aged six. Concerning 1965 and 1969, they adopted a few small children, Andrew, Paul and Gillian. They survive her, as do a more youthful sister, Ruth, and three grandchildren, Grace, Jemma and John.