When I first read that paragraph, I thought she was talking about a school trip. It turns out that it wasn't a bunch of yet-to-be-educated 14-year-olds, but a

When I first read that paragraph, I thought she was talking about a school trip. It turns out that it wasn't a bunch of yet-to-be-educated 14-year-olds, but a group including at least two senior female professionals in the technology industry. In their defence, it could just be because they are foreign. There are probably plenty of highly significant historical Americans of whom I've never heard, but every US schoolchild is expected to know intimately. A further defence might be that she does know all about Lady Lovelace, and that this "Never heard of her" business is just a rhetorical device to so that the reader and the author appear to go on the same journey of revelation.