Dorothy Hatfield
Dorothy Helen Hatfield OBE FRAeS was a British aeronautical engineer. In 1956, she was the first female engineering apprentice at Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft), Brooklands. She became President of the Women's Engineering Society and was instrumental in setting up the Daphne Jackson Trust and the Lady Finniston Award for first year female engineering students. Hatfield was appointed an OBE for services to engineering in the 2014 Birthday Honours.
Early life and education
Dorothy McRither was born in January 1940 and brought up in Surrey. She left school at 16 and, in 1956, successfully applied to be an engineering apprentice at Vickers-Armstrongs Ltd, Brooklands, the first woman to do so. After six years, she graduated with a first class honours degree in aeronautical engineering.McRither married a fellow apprentice and took his surname Hatfield. They had three children who Hatfield took a career break to raise.
Career
Hatfield then returned to work in the flight simulation industry, working in the technical publications department of Redifon Flight Simulation, before moving into Sales Engineering. She then worked the science and engineering division of a software house before becoming a Pricing Manager at Rediffusion. She was Trust Executive to the Daphne Jackson Trust for a time. She worked as a Contracts Manager at the Quadrant Group which manufactured aircraft parts, then at a flight simulation company in Sussex before retiring in 2001.Hatfield joined the Women's Engineering Society in 1962 and was its president from 1989 to 1991, overseeing the ninth International Conference of Women Engineers and Scientists in Warwick in 1990. She became a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society in 1996.