She is extremely pragmatic and fiercely devoted to her church and her children. Johnson is one of the only living computers Shetterly features in the book and one of the few Shetterly meets with in person.ĭorothy Vaughan is a strong-minded, black mathematician who joins Langley as a human computer in 1943 and then works her way up to become the organization’s first black section head. She distinguishes herself first as a computer for the Flight Research Team and later as an aerospace technologist, becoming the first woman to publish a research paper on space flight.
In one memorable event, astronaut John Glenn-who doesn’t trust the calculations performed by NASA’s new IBM computers-asks Johnson to double-check the numbers for his flight trajectory and landing, and she does so successfully. Though she comes up against racism more than once at the NACA, she maintains her sparkplug personality and manages to charm everyone she comes into contact with, without losing sight of her dedication to her work and her community. Upon joining the segregated NACA workforce in 1953, she refuses to use the colored bathrooms or to allow prejudice to make her feel small. Born in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, Johnson worked as a math teacher and briefly pursued graduate study in mathematics before joining the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics as a computer under Dorothy Vaughan. Katherine Coleman (who took on the married names Goble and Johnson) is a passionate, outspoken black mathematician who works in the Flight Research Division at the Langley Research Center.