![]() ![]() I counted the steps to the road, the steps up to church, the number of dishes and silverware I washedanything that could be counted, I did. ![]() If I gave you that answer last year, it’s the same now. Katherine Johnson was born on August 26, 1918, in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. She began working in aeronautics as a 'computer' in 1952, and after. And it was a joy to contribute to the literature that was going to be coming out.īut you know, math is the same. Katherine Johnson made the most of limited educational opportunities for African Americans, graduating from college at age 18. I like the stars and the stories we were telling. The main thing is I liked what I was doing. I didn’t do anything alone but try to go to the root of the question – and succeeded there. Her calculations proved critical to the success of the Apollo Moon landings and the start of the Space Shuttle program. Katherine continued to work at NASA until 1986. But when they went to computers, they called over and said, "Tell her to check and see if the computer trajectory they had calculated was correct." So I checked it, and it was correct. A female African-American mathematician, she completed crucial calculations that sent Alan. ![]() You could do much more, much faster on the computer. Katherine Johnson is an unsung hero of NASA and the Space Race. You tell me when you want it and where you want it to land, and I'll do it backward and tell you when to take off." That was my forte.Įven after NASA had electronic computers, John Glenn requested that Katherine personally recheck the computer calculations before his 1962 Friendship 7 flight – the first American mission to orbit Earth. And they said, 'Well, the girls don't usually go.' and I said, 'Well, is there a law?' They said, 'No.' So then my boss said, 'Let her go.As a human computer, Katherine calculated the trajectory for astronaut Alan Shepard’s 1961 Freedom 7 mission to space – the first spaceflight for an American.Įarly on, when they said they wanted the capsule to come down at a certain place, they were trying to compute when it should start. As Johnson told public television station WHRO in 2011, none of it held her back: "I just happened to be working with guys and when they had briefings, I asked permission to go. The women battled both racism and sexism. She was one of a handful of African American women hired to do computing in the guidance and navigation department at Langley's Research Center in Virginia. "Everybody there was doing research," she recalled in later years, "You had a mission and you worked on it." She initially became a teacher but, in 1953, took a job at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics - the agency that would become NASA. She graduated from high school at 14 and finished college with degrees in math and French from historically black West Virginia State College. Unable to stay away from high-level math for long, however, she soon enrolled in the advanced mathematics graduate program at West Virginia State. As a young girl, she was fascinated by numbers and it was clear early on she was gifted. NASA As a black female scientist, Katherine Johnson broke through overwhelming race and gender barriers in order to succeed. Johnson was born in West Virginia in 1918. "Her story and her grace continue to inspire the world." "The NASA family will never forget Katherine Johnson's courage and the milestones we could not have reached without her," Bridenstine wrote on Twitter. Katherine Johnson, one of the NASA mathematicians depicted in the movie Hidden Figures, turns 100 in August, and NASA recently named a research center after. Her death was announced by NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. She calculated the flight path for America's first crewed space mission and moon landing, and she was among the women profiled in the book and movie Hidden Figures. Katherine Johnson, a mathematician who was one of NASA's human "computers" and an unsung hero of the space agency's early days, died Monday. During her 35-year career at NASA and its predecessor, she earned a reputation for mastering complex manual calculations and helped pioneer the use of computers. NASA mathematician Katherine Johnson, pictured at the 2017 Academy Awards, was one of the women profiled in the book and film Hidden Figures.
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