Priscilla Fuller

Priscilla Fuller is one of South Africa's first female computer programmers. At age 19 in 1963, following a disagreement with her mother, she took an aptitude test at International Computer Tabulators, was hired despite the company's stated preference for male applicants over 30, and completed a five week training course, going on to work with ICT 1500 computer systems on operating systems for firms including Stewart and Lloyds and Pfizer and for the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, before moving to the National Cash Registers division for further training. She traveled to the United Kingdom to advance her career and then worked for about a decade in Vancouver, Canada, beginning at age 23, where she was involved in the development of disc drivers, the forerunners of the floppy disc. Returning to South Africa in 1977 as computers grew more widespread, she developed accounting systems for government departments that remained in use until their retirement in 2010, and later helped prepare systems for the Year 2000 transition, over a programming career spanning five decades.