Raye Montague

First person to design a naval ship with a computer.

Raye Montague revolutionized the process of drafting a design for naval ships and submarines.

Raye Montague was born in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1935. During World War II, her grandfather took her to see a captured German submarine. On this trip, she learned that the people who make submarines are called engineers, and she decided that she would be one.

Raye had a confidence taught to her by her mother. She recalls her mother saying,

“You will have three strikes against you. You’re female, you’re Black, and you’ll have a southern segregated school education. But you can be or do anything you want, provided you’re educated.”

After high school, she wanted to study engineering at University of Arkansas, Fayetteville but no college in the state was admitting Black students to those programs. Instead, Raye got a degree in business from Arkansas Agricultural, Mechanical, and Normal College, graduating in 1956. Right after that, she moved to Washington D.C. and got a job as a typist at the Department of the Navy.

Over the years, she moved up the ranks and began taking night classes in computer programming. When she asked her boss for a promotion, he told her that to earn the promotion, she would have to take the night shift for a while. Not having a car and without public transportation so late, Raye bought a car for cheap and taught herself how to drive. She earned the promotion and went back to working the day shift.

Her career took off when she was assigned the task of working out how a ship could be designed, step-by-step, using a computer. Her boss and his department had not been able to accomplish this on their own and gave her six months to complete it. When she accomplished the task, her success caught the attention of President Richard Nixon, who asked that she draft a design for a ship with a computer.

Designing ships by-hand generally took two years of work. Raye Montague completed her draft in 18 hours and 26 minutes. This made her the first person to design a ship with a computer.

In her 34-year career, Raye received various awards and recognition for her work, including the Navy’s Meritorious Civilian Service Award, it’s third-highest honor. She retired in 1990 and moved back to Little Rock to be with her family. She spent her retirement engaged with her communities youth and inmates, inspiring everyone she interacted with. Raye died in 2018.