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GPS Pioneer Dr. Gladys West Dies at 95 Dr. Gladys West, the brilliant mathematician whose groundbreaking work made modern GPS technology possible, died January 17, 2026, at age 95. Born on a Virginia tobacco farm in 1930 during Jim Crow segregation, West became valedictorian, earned mathematics degrees, and in 1956 became the second Black woman hired at the Naval Surface Warfare Center. For 42 years, she developed complex algorithms using the IBM 7030 supercomputer to create precise geodetic mod