For the most part, Ada did not take after her father’s more romantic nature. Instead, from a young age, she expressed strong interest in scientific pursuits. In her early teens, she became determined to create an apparatus to learn how to fly. It was not an unserious endeavor – she carefully studied the anatomy of birds, considered materials and durability, and drew many different potential designs. In a prelude to her later and more revolutionary work, one biographer describes her, even in adolescence, as “light years ahead of her time.”

The idea of the flying machine got left behind in Ada’s youth, especially after a prolonged illness, but Lady Byron saw that Ada had a mathematical gift, and employed two highly skilled men to tutor Ada in mathematics and physics. However, it was when Ada encountered the work of Charles Babbage that her most long-lasting contributions to science and her life’s work had begun.