Johnson doing work at NASA in 1966.Source
Katherine Johnson was born on August 26, 1918 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. Growing up, she enjoyed counting and was very good at it, “I counted everything. I counted the steps to the road, the steps up to church, the number of dishes and silverware I washed … anything that could be counted, I did.” When she began school, her talent in math and skills with numbers pushed her ahead. By the time she was 10, she was already in High School. Johnson began her career as a teacher and left when she was one of three black people asked to integrate a graduate school in Virginia.
In the summer of 1953, Katherine began her work at the all-black West Area Computing section at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics’. This meant that she was a ‘computer.’ Her, along with many other women of color did all the calculations that needed to be worked or verified for engineers. Her calculations were so successful that she was able to help with trajectory analysis, flight path, for the first human spaceflight in May 1961. This mission was known as Freedom 7. In 1962 John Glenn was being prepared for an orbital Mission known as Friendship 7. IBM machines were introduced to NASA around this time which meant that the women no longer did many calculations, the machines did. Glenn alongside many other were still skeptical with the functionality of the machines because of possible malfunctions. He requested that Johnson do the work manually saying, “Get that girl...If she says they’re good, then i’m ready to go.” Not only was she able to send astronauts into orbit but she was also able to help get astronauts to the moon in 1969 with the Apollo 11 Mission.
