During a winter movie time of year dominate by sci - fi and tales of fantasy , the true story behind " Hidden figure " propel three mostly nameless adult female into public awareness , albeit 60 or so days after their heyday .
The movie , released on Jan. 6 , 2017 , is base on the history of three dim women who add to the United States ' succeeder in the Space Race of 1957–1975 . All bright mathematicians and scientist , Katherine Johnson , Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson defy the societal constraint visit upon black women of the sidereal day .
It all began in 1943 , the prime of World War II , when Vaughan come on board at the Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory . The lab was part of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics ( NACA ) , which would after becomeNASA . The warfare effort was maneuver skyward , which incited a massive hiring button to meet need for " human computers " to process aeronautical data . Hiring Vaughan and other people of people of colour was possible thanks to anexecutive orderPresident Roosevelt issued in 1941 that proscribe favoritism in government and defense job , and created theFair Employment Practices Commission . Executive Order 9346 , issued in 1943 , extend the commission ’s big businessman to enforce nondiscriminatory hire policy . These fiat are largely seen as the first governmental acknowledgement of racial employment disparity since Reconstruction , the turbulent flow after the Civil War .
The Jim Crow twelvemonth were still in full swing , though — so the African - Americans , known together with as the West Area Computing Unit , and white people working for on the program were segregated . Jackson joined the computation team in 1951 , and Johnson followed suit in 1953 . As the Space Race began to step up after the war , so did the emphasis on aerospace data . The three women enjoyed no shortage of acquirement , before and throughout their year at NASA . Here are five notable achievements .
1 . They successfully direct astronauts into space .
Katherine Johnson was a demonstrate mathematics wiz , having graduate high-pitched schooling at age 14 and college at age 18 . She calculate the trajectory for the spacefaring ofAlan Shephard , who made history in 1961 as the first American in blank . later on , when actual computers were employed to plot John Glenn ’s Friendship 7 missionary work , the astronaut specifically asked for Johnson to start the numbers pool by script , so potent was his trust of her numerical art .
2 . Katherine Johnson help oneself integrate West Virginia University .
In 1939 , Johnson was one of three scholar chosen tointegrate West Virginia University . A pioneer before she joined NACA , Johnson enrol in the traditionally white grad program years — and in some cases decades — before many other university watch suit .
3 . Dorothy Vaughan was NASA ’s first bleak managing director .
Vaughan , the first of the trio to join NACA , so excelled as a computer that she waspromoted in 1949to make out the woman of West End Computing . It was rare for a woman to achieve such a position , but for a black woman , it was practically unheard of . She ran the mathematical group for almost a decennium , until unintegrated facility were done away with . During her management term of office , she advocated for promotions and pay off increases for her faculty , as well as for ashen women put to work as computers in other groups .
4 . Mary Jackson was the first bootleg distaff engineer at NASA .
Jackson spent two years in the computing position , but opted to solve for NASA engineer Kazimierz Czarnecki when the opportunity arose . At his goading , she gained permission to connect white - only classes and enroll in a preparation program that earned her a advancement from mathematician to engineer . In 1958 , she became NASA’sfirst black female engineer .
5 . Vaughan sent orbiter into place .
After the NASA offices were integrate and she lost her direction claim , Vaughan did n’t slow up down . Sheproved her scientific talentyet again by becoming a skilful coder ofFORTRAN , a figurer programming language that revolutionized the speed and effectualness of the process . Using those attainment , she helped transmit satellites into orbit as part of the pivotalSCOUT(solid controlled orbital utility program trial ) Launch Vehicle Program .
