Katherine Johnson, born in 1918, was an African American mathematician. She had an unbelievable mathematical talent from a young age, and she began attending high school at just ten years old! She later graduated from West Virginia State College at 18 with a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and French.
Johnson became the first of three black teachers at West Virginia University. She left the job to start a family and came back when her daughters got older. Shortly after, she began working with the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). During the time she worked there, NACA was segregated, so Johnson had to use separate bathrooms, computers, and even other facilities. Johnson worked with a group of women who were called West Computers because they had to manually undertake complex algorithms and operations that were instrumental to NACA’s success. NACA was soon succeeded by NASA, which banned segregation. With NASA, Johnson accomplished several things such as calculating the path for Freedom 7, the first US human spaceflight. She also calculated the time and place to launch the rocket for the mission Apollo 11, the first mission that landed three men on the moon.
Because of her extremely important contributions to American space exploration, Johnson was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 2019. Additionally, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by former President Obama, as a symbol for American discovery. Her story and career are noted in the movie Hidden Figures released in 2016. Unfortunately, Johnson passed away in 2020. However, her legacy continues to live on to this day. She has inspired several women to pursue careers in male-dominated fields and continue to work towards a goal no matter the obstacle faced. She had faced several in her time, segregation and sexism to name a few. But, she worked through them all to get where she wanted to be.
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