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An interactive exhibit at Virginia Tech’s Innovation Campus in Alexandria is spotlighting Gladys West, the pioneering mathematician whose work helped lay the foundation for modern GPS.
The National Center of Women’s Innovation opened the exhibit March 7 in Potomac Yard. It traces how West overcame the barriers of growing up in segregated Virginia before helping develop technology now used for navigation around the world.
“West was pioneering work at a time when people who looked like her, both female and African American, just weren’t working in those fields,” Innovation Campus Executive Director Lance Collins said. “What a remarkable story and inspiration to all of us.”
Local officials and members of West’s family attended the exhibit’s launch.
“You don’t often get to meet your superheroes,” said her grandson, Andre Jones. “But I got to grow up with two of them — my grandfather and my grandmother.”
Jones said West worked tirelessly, sought to excel at her job and remained determined to rise above the circumstances around her.
Born Oct. 27, 1930, in rural Dinwiddie County, West graduated as her high school’s valedictorian and received a full scholarship to Virginia State College, where she studied mathematics.
In 1956, she began working with satellite data analysis and processing systems at what is now the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren. West was the second Black woman hired there and one of only four Black employees. She also met her future husband, mathematician Ira West, at the base.
During her career, West led work on a mathematical model of the Earth that became part of the framework for GPS. She spent 42 years at Dahlgren before retiring in 1998, then completed a doctorate in public administration at Virginia Tech in 2000.
West was inducted into the United States Air Force Hall of Fame in 2018. Capt. Godfrey Weekes, commanding officer of the Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division, said her work in satellite geodesy improved the accuracy of GPS and satellite-data measurements.
“As Gladys West started her career in 1956, she likely had no idea that her work would impact the world for decades to come,” Weekes said.
West, 94, lives with her daughter in Fredericksburg. Although she could not attend the reception, her grandson connected with her by video so she could greet the crowd.
Jones said his grandmother never set out to build a public legacy and that his grandparents did not boast about their accomplishments. He urged people to keep women’s history prominent for young girls searching for heroes and inspiration.
The exhibit will remain at the Virginia Tech Innovation Campus in Potomac Yard through the end of June. It is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday.