Hicks, Beatrice Alice (1919-1979), was a prominent American woman engineer. She helped found the Society of Women Engineers, an educational and service organization, and served as its first president.
In 1941, Hicks became the first woman engineer employed by the Western Electric Company. While at Western Electric, she also studied electrical engineering and library research. In 1946, Hicks’s father died, and she joined the Newark Controls Company, a company he had founded. Hicks first served as vice president and chief engineer. She made important contributions to the development of various sensing devices for heating and cooling systems. In 1955, Hicks became the company’s president.
Hicks was born in Orange, New Jersey. She earned a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Newark College of Engineering and a master’s degree in physics from Stevens Institute of Technology. In 1948, Hicks married Rodney Duane Chipp, a radio and television engineer. She joined a group of other women engineers and engineering students in founding the Society of Women Engineers in 1950. She served as the society’s president from 1950 to 1952.
