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Home , Dorothy Vaughan, Katherine Johnson, Margot Lee Shetterly

NASA K bly, spenttwo years teaching inWest Virginia’s required to go into classroom teaching. degreeswith mathematics were most often work; priorto theSecond World War, women would beableto putthisrigorous training to pupil norteacher knewwhere, oreven if, she can Americanto earnaPhDinmaths.Neither Waldron Schieffelin Claytor, thethird Afri top student of acclaimed topologist William to There, study mathematics. shebecamethe black West Virginia State College inInstitute was just 14 whensheentered thehistorically her to skipseveral grades inschool, andshe rights-era United States. Teachers allowed were called ‘coloured’ students in the pre-civil- local school beyond sixth grade forthose who parents to beeducated, because there was no lings were sent 200 kilometres away by their Springs, West Virginia, sheandherthree sib anything but. talent asaprofessional mathematicianwas everything —thepossibility of deploying her — she recalled counting dishes, stars, steps, with numbers was obvious from childhood twentieth century. Althoughherfascination and computingmatics over the course of the have madeto science, technology, mathe tions thatwomen andminorityethnicgroups symbol of theoften-unheralded contribu her curiosity, Johnsonbecameapowerful just doingmy job.” meetings, shewas most likely to reply: “Iwas the no-women in her division’s policy research segregated workplace, orof having upended Asked aboutthechallenges of beingblackina , andthereleaseFigures based of thefilm onit. the publicationof my group Hidden professional reputation. orbital space flight in 1962 that established her naut ’s pioneering equations for astrochecking the trajectory the Moon.Butitwas herrole producing and Apollo 11mission to humanon place thefirst of the calculations that she contributed to the 1930s untilthe1980s. Johnsonwas most proud Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), from the NASA mathematicianwhocalculated trajectories forearlyspace flights. (1918–2020) Obituary Johnson graduated in1937 and, predicta Born Katherine Coleman inWhite Sulphur A gifted mathematicianwhoalways followed Wider fameforJohnsoncamein2016 with its predecessor, theNationalAdvisory ematicians whoworked atNASAand “human ” —female math recognized of theAfricanAmerican atherine Johnsonwas themost ------“The flight forever“The linked a satellite in 1957 ignited the space race and raising afamily and teaching inpublic schools left to get married, andspentthenext 13 years gantown. After onesemester, however, she programme inWest Virginia University, Mor- dents to beallowed to study in thegraduate State College to blackstu beoneof thefirst hand-picked by thepresident of West Virginia segregated public schools. In1939, shewas spurred thetransformation of NACA into the commercial aviation. leading to improved safety and formilitary gated phenomena such aswake turbulence, part of anengineering team thatinvesti simulations. For five years, Johnsonwas aeroplanes,actual rather than wind-tunnel Division, agroup thatspecialized intests on anher opening to in the Flight fill Research matician . Vaughan soon sent West Area Computing Unit,helmed by mathe She began her career in the all-black, all-female called theLangley Aeronautical Laboratory. research outpost inHampton, Virginia, then in neighbouringVirginia. to one of the United States’ to oneoftheUnited States’ most gloriousachievements.” black female mathematician black female mathematician © The Soviet Union’s launch of theSputnik In 1952 she appliedto work atNACA’s

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A l l r i g h t s r e s e r v e d . - - - regularly visited classrooms to enchant play inamission apart that enabledtheUnited a woman inherdivision,andpositioned herto flight piloted by Glenn. form the basis of that crewed orbital space Position’, laying out the equations that would for PlacingaSatellite Over aSelected ‘Determination AngleatBurnout of Azimuth year, sheco-authored theresearch report for acrewed suborbital flight. Thefollowing By 1959, shehadprepared analysis atrajectory hensive reference documentonspace flight. Space Technology’, theagency’s compre first 1958, Johnsonhadcontributed to ‘Notes on diverted its attention to spacecraft, and by space agency. TheFlightResearch Division her research. interviewed Katherine Johnson extensively for producer She of the film adaptation. 2016 book is the author of the deflect theattention. characteristic understatement, soughtto into somethingof acelebrity, Johnson,with as thepopularityof turnedher HiddenFigures technology, Even engineeringormathematics. ofthe benefits pursuing acareer inscience, students withthewonders of and mathematics ment of historically blackcolleges. work eachyear to attend abasketball tourna - employee, andthetwo took aweek off from Eunice Smith,anotherWest Area Computing and JohnYoung. Shebecame best friendswith tive game of bridge with engineers Al Hamer her atdesk,playing afiercely competi the sameenthusiasm.Lunch usually found embraced herwork andhercolleagues with the Space Shuttle. spent thelatter years of her career working on crewedule duringthefirst Moonlanding.She orbit of ’s command mod and service later contributed calculationsto theparking States’ most gloriousachievements. Johnson female mathematician to one of the United . Theflight forever linked ablack tions thathadbeeninputinto theIBM7090 equa thetrajectory called her—to hand-check asked Johnson—“thegirl”, ashe In the days leading up to Glenn’s flight, the one of thepivotal momentsof thespace race. States to draw even with the Soviet Union — Her named credit on the report was for a first After retiring from NASA in 1986, she Charismatic andgregarious, Johnson |Vol 579 | 19 March 2020 |341 , and an executive - - - -