The section “Milestones in women's history from the year you were born” includes 1939: Kitty O'Brien Joyner is NASA's first woman engineer Kitty O’Brien Joyner broke ground twice in 1939. After suing to be admitted into the University of Virginia’s engineering program, she was the first woman to graduate from the program that year. The electrical engineering knowledge she gained let her blaze a new trail several months later when NACA, the predecessor to NASA, hired her. She worked there for decades, eventually becoming branch head, before retiring in 1971.