During a press conference at NASA ’ s Jet Propulsion Laboratory , Cassini project scientist Linda Spilker , center , speaks about a montage of images , made from data obtained by Cassini ’ s visual and infrared mapping spectrometer , showing the location on Saturn where the spacecraft entered Saturn ’ s atmosphere Sept . 15 , 2017 . Cassini program manager at JPL , Earl Maize , left , and spacecraft operations team manager for the Cassini mission at Saturn , Julie Webster , right , also participated in the press conference .
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I like this project . I love Saturn and the rings . When
I started I didn ’ t think I ’ d necessarily see it through to the end , but it ’ s very gratifying . I ’ m so proud to have said I started on Cassini in the very beginning and I ’ ve managed to go all the way to the end .
of positions but especially at the top ,” she said . “ That ’ s been very wonderful to see and be a part of , too .” Like many women both inside and outside astronomyrelated fields , Spilker puts balancing a family with a very active career near the top of the list when asked about challenges she has faced . She grew up on a street where there were no working moms and that was still the prevailing paradigm in the late 1970s as she was beginning her career . At one point in those early years at JPL , Spilker and one of her female colleagues were asked by a high-level manager , who was male , why they felt like they had to work . “ He said ‘ My wife is perfectly happy to stay at home , and take care of the house , and take care of the kids . Help me understand why women feel like they need to have a job outside of the home .’ We looked at him and we said , ‘ Well , you know it ’ s very fulfilling to work on a mission like Voyager . We have kids , and we have a family and we have all of these other things . But we want to be in the work force , too ,’” she recalls . “ I thought that was interesting . It was a very serious question from someone who was sort of looking
COURTESY OF NASA / Joel Kowsky
for an answer back in the late 70s of why women felt like that had to work especially in technical jobs . Of course you ’ d never get asked that question today , but I sensed it was a general curiosity — that he was curious and probably we weren ’ t the only people he had asked this question of .” One factor that helped Spilker find that crucial balance was the timing of the Voyager mission . She had her daughters during a five-year window between the Saturn flybys in the 1980s and the Uranus flyby in 1986 . “ I had my daughters just at the very beginning of that , and I tell them , ‘ your births are based on the alignment of the planets . And I really mean that , I had five years to have you and have you grow up and be ready to go to preschool and kindergarten by the time all of these things got started ,’” she said . Spilker ’ s career has always been driven by the science . During her Voyager years , she was fascinated by the work of Project Scientist Ed Stone . “ I really liked what he was doing because he got to look at all of the science , not just one piece of the science . I remember saying to a friend of mine , ‘ you know , the job I ’ d really like in the future is a job like his ,’” she said . That desire stuck with her , so when the opportunity to be deputy project scientist on Cassini came up in 1997 , she jumped at the chance . In 2010 , Spilker ascended to the post of project scientist for
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