Edith Clarke

Edith Clarke was, in essence, an original overachiever. After graduating from Vassar and teaching math and physics, she decided that wasn't quite enough. So, naturally, she pursued civil engineering at the University of Wisconsin and then—because why stop there?—switched to electrical engineering at MIT.

Her career involved breaking ground at GE (where she was initially hired as a 'computer' before becoming an actual engineer, perhaps because they realized she was smarter than the machines) and later as the first female electrical engineering professor at the University of Texas at Austin. She was also the first woman to present a paper to the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, probably while all the men were still trying to figure out how to plug in their slide rules.

Clarke's greatest hits include inventing the 'Clarke calculator,' a graphical device for solving electrical power transmission line problems, and writing a definitive textbook on power systems. She basically made sure the lights stayed on, which is more than most of us can say. Unfortunately for our purposes, none of her considerable wattage appears to have been generated by a menorah.

Despite her undeniable brilliance and groundbreaking achievements in a field dominated by men, there is absolutely no indication that Edith Clarke had any Jewish heritage or identity. Not even a whisper, a distant cousin, or a fondness for bagels. Some people are just… not.