Katherine Johnson: Hidden Figure

It’s been about a year since the film Hidden Figures came to theaters, and ever since I saw it, I’ve been meaning to write a bit about these remarkable women here on the blog. The movie is based on the book by Margot Lee Shetterly and mainly focuses on three black women and their struggles and triumphs while working for NASA. It is set in the early days of the Cold War and the Civil Rights movement. I will mainly focus on Katherine Johnson, a mathematician who worked on calculations for trajectories, launch windows, and emergency back-up plans for many NASA missions. She was a hard-working and confident woman, and while she worked to achieve and equal footing with her male co-workers, she also valued her role as a wife and mother.

Many of the women who worked for NASA joined the organization during World War II, when it was NACA—National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics—with the job title of “computer.” In the days before modern computers, human beings had to crunch the numbers and run the calculations required for designing and building airplanes. Aviation was still a young industry, with much to be discovered and many kinks to be worked out, and well-designed fighters and bombers were a vital component of the war. Due to the labor shortage, women were recruited to fill the gaps. Rosie the Riveter encouraged women to take jobs in factories, but there were also jobs for women like Katherine Johnson who had a knack for knumbers. Sorry! Numbers.

Katherine was born in 1918 in West Virginia. From an early age she demonstrated exceptional mathematical abilities and started attending high school at the age of ten. At age fourteen she enrolled at West Virginia State College and graduated summa cum laude with degrees in Math and French. She spent a few years teaching in Virginia and then decided to pursue her graduate degree in math. Needless to say, she was the only black female in her program. Katherine dropped out of the program after only completing the introductory summer session in 1940, but not because she couldn’t handle the work—she and her husband, Jimmy Goble, were expecting their first child!

For the next twelve years, Katherine and Jimmy worked as public school teachers while raising their three daughters, with Katherine taking time as a stay-at-home mom when her daughters were younger. Even with two incomes and summer jobs, the Gobles struggled to make ends meet. Katherine saved extra money by sewing dresses for herself and her daughters. But Katherine and Jimmy wanted to do more than just get by. They wanted their daughters to go to college when they were older, but for that to happen, something needed to change. Katherine heard about a government facility in Virginia that was hiring black female mathematicians—NACA. She could make three times more than she did as a teacher, and they had family there who were sure that her husband would also be able to find good, steady work. The Gobles decided to take their lives in a new direction.

Not even looking back at the explosion, because they're that cool.

Katherine joined NACA in 1953, and soon was transferred to the Flight Research Laboratory. There she was one of only four females, one other of which was black. Katherine did not expect any special treatment or lower standards of excellence because she was a woman. She worked hard and proved to the other mathematicians and engineers that the was every bit as smart as they were. They came to respect her and her abilities, and to appreciate her enthusiasm for the same topics that interested them—nerdy stuff.

But while things were going well for Katherine at work, life at home was becoming more difficult. Her husband Jimmy was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor in 1955, and he died just before Christmas the following year, leaving Katherine to raise their three girls on her own. Her daughters took on more responsibilities around the house, such as making dinner and doing laundry, so that she could complete the tasks which would have been her husband’s. Katherine expected that this would be her life from now on, but in 1958 a new young man joined her church. James Johnson was an army captain who spent much of his military career working on repairing aircraft. He soon began courting Katerine, and they married in August of 1959.

Aaawww!

Shortly before Katherine Gobles became Katherine Johnson, NACA became NASA—National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The focus had shifted from researching and improving airplanes to exploring beyond the earth’s atmosphere. This was the beginning of the “Space Race,” the contest between Communist Russia and Capitalist-Democratic America to see which country would be the first in space, first to orbit the earth, and first to put a man on the moon. Katherine continued working with the same group, but with new projects. She crunched numbers, drew up charts and equations, helping to prepare the technical reports which were then presented to a committee and then discussed. As a woman, Katherine was not invited to attend these editorial meetings. It just wasn’t done. But Katherine stated her case that as a contributing member of the group, she had the right to be a part of these meetings. Soon she was given permission to attend the meetings, and before long she was given credit as an author of a research report, another rarity for women at that time.

Until her retirement from NASA in 1986, Katherine gave her job her all. She held herself to high expectations of precision and thoroughness, and was always ready for the next challenge, be it learning how to use digital computers to her best advantage, or calculating trajectories for a mission to Mars. She never looked for recognition or reward beyond her own knowledge of a job well done and the satisfaction of seeing her own daughters succeed, but all honors that came her way she accepted modestly and graciously. Katherine was first noticed by the public after newspapers picked up the story of her role in calculating the re-entry for John Glenn’s orbit of the earth. Later in her career she received multiple honorary doctorates and awards from NASA. In 2015, at the age of 97, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her contributions to the space program and her own personal accomplishments. On August 27, 2018, she will reach another milestone in life and turn 100 years old.

This movie is much more intense, fun, and heartwarming than I probably make it sound like, and if you haven't seen it, I heartily recommend it. Maybe a girls night?