The incredible fortitude of the mathematicians made us proud, and the fact it took so long to recognize their contributions to this country made us shake our heads in disgust. The restrictions imposed on black Americans made us angry.
We became more engrossed with each mile, until we became part of the narrative. The payoff was that they could finally push their extraordinary intelligence and exceptional skills to the limit.
But throughout the decades, they had to endure the humiliation of Jim Crow, the tumult and tragedies of the emergence of the Civil Rights movement, and the reality that although they were giving their all for their country, their country continued to treat them as second class citizens. The women were the, “Human Computers and were referred to as such. The West Computing” group began their jobs at Langley using calculators and slide rules. At the peak of their careers, they provided NASA with the precise calculations required to win the space race by putting a man on the moon. These phenomenal mathematicians began their ground-breaking careers in the 1940s and continued to excel during the Cold War era. And what a difference they made! Katherine Johnson (©NASA) These women were hard working, brilliant, and determined to use their extraordinary skills as mathematicians to make a difference. They left their homes and their jobs as math teachers in segregated Southern public schools to join the all black West Computing” group at Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory in Hampton, Virginia. In this nonfiction masterpiece, Margot Lee Shetterly tells the true story of four black female mathematicians, Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson, and Christine Darden, as well as their colleagues, which began during World War II. But this time, I had something different in mind: ”Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race”, a stunning work I had wanted to read since it was published in 2016.
He was expecting a thriller, which is our usual fare for helping the miles go by. “What are we going to read, asked Simon as I cued up an audio book for the six-hour drive. It was our first trip back to New Bern since we moved to Greenville last December. The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race
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