Late great engineers: Hilda Lyon

Nick Smith explores the life of one of the most important women engineers of the 20^th century, Hilda Lyon, whose name lives on in her eponymous ‘Lyon Shape’ streamline design used in submarines and airships.

On 26^th June 2019 the small Yorkshire town of Market Weighton played host to a blue plaque unveiling commemorating the life of Hilda Lyon, a shopkeeper’s daughter who was to become one of the most influential women engineers of the 20^th century. The unusually long citation narrative that follows her name, post-nominal letters and general description of her as ‘aeronautical engineer,’ credits her with helping to design the R101 airship, inventing the ‘Lyon Shape’ and being the first female recipient of the Royal Aeronautical Society’s R38 Memorial Prize. Beneath this list of accolades, the blue plaque (located at her father’s shop in the town’s High Street) reads: ‘Her work is still used for stability software and submarine design.’ For Lyon’s relatives – many had crossed the Atlantic for the ceremony – this recognition of the British engineer, described by Flying magazine in 1934 as “the classic authority on the subject of stresses in transverse frames,” was both overdue and appreciated.