Mary Jane Early Fitch, former director of Penn’s Computer Center, died May 15, 2024. She was 76.

Ms. Fitch was born in Lansdowne, Pennsylvania. She studied political science at Temple University and English commonlaw at Exeter College of Oxford University on an exchange program. She then worked at Penn as director of the Computer Center and Penn’s Institute of Philadelphia Studies under Dean Richard Lambert, where she developed computer models for data analytics. As a woman in early computer science graduate work at the Moore School of Electrical Engineering, she was a pioneer in her field. She became an expert in mainframe computers and joined an international consulting firm, Ketron, developing highly technical, computer-language translation models, traveling regularly between Tokyo and the Silicon Valley, and serving on Fujitsu America’s board of directors. 

Ms. Fitch achieved her lifelong dream to practice law in 1996, when she received a JD from the Widener School of Law and was admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar. She was sworn into the Supreme Court Bar Association under Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2013. Ms. Fitch made important contributions to data analytics and computer science in academia, in addition to her international management consulting, entrepreneurship, and legal work.

She is survived by her daughters, Amy Fitch Lancaster (Charles) and Emily Fitch Zimmerman (Christopher Day); her grandchildren, Julia and Hallie Lancaster; her sisters, Patricia Cohen (Ronald), Beatrice Fitch (Zoran), Pamela Fitch (Abraham), and Priscilla Fitch; her cousin, Dawn Sheppard; and her friend, Carol Kette.