110 “Why don’t you come work for me?”: Ibid.
110 Ray Wright had the intuition: Donald D. Baals and William R. Corliss, Wind Tunnels of NASA (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 1981), 61.
110 “long sought technical prize”: Ibid., 61.
110 as much as 25 percent: Richard Whitcomb’s Discovery: Richard Whitcomb’s Discovery: The Story of the Area Rule, video, NASA Langley CRGIS, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZWBVgL8I54.
111 “wasp-waisted”: “Air Scientist Whitcomb Cited for ‘Wasp-Waist’ Theory,” Richmond News Leader, November 29, 1955.
111 a sit-down with CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite: “Interview Set for Whitcomb with Cronkite,” Daily Press, October 15, 1955.
111 “Hampton Engineer Besieged by Public”: Daily Press, October 9, 1955.
111 “an oil refinery under a roof”: Baals and Corliss, Wind Tunnels of NASA, 71.
112 aeronautical research scientist, graded GS-9: Hoover Personnel file.
112 publication of two reports: Frank Malvestuto Jr. and Dorothy M. Hoover, “Supersonic Lift and Pitching Moment of Thin Sweptback Tapered Wings Produced by Constant Vertical Acceleration,” Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, March 1951, http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930082993.pdf; Frank Malvestuto Jr. and Dorothy M. Hoover, “Lift and Pitching Derivatives of Thin Sweptback Tapered Wings with Streamwise Tips and Subsonic Leading Edges at Supersonic Speeds,” Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, February 1951, http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19930082953.pdf.
113 Mary had done since graduating: “Mary W. Jackson, Federal Women’s Program Manager,” October 1979.
113 Mary Jackson had met Jim Williams: Julia G. Williams, personal interview, July 20, 2014.
113 wary of moving: Ibid.
113 Williams wasn’t the first black engineer: Ibid.
113 Several white supervisors refused him: Norman Tippens, “Tuskegee Airman James L. ‘Jim’ Williams, 77,” Daily Press, January 23, 2004; Williams interview.
113 raised his hand right away: Williams interview.
113 “Jaybird was as fair as it got”: Ibid.
113 “So how long do you think you’re going to be able to hang on?”: Ibid.
114 given an assignment by John Becker: Golemba, “Human Computers,” 64; Langley Memorial Laboratory Telephone Directory, 1952.
114 insisting that her calculations were wrong: Ibid.
114 the problem wasn’t with her output: Ibid.
114 John Becker apologized to Mary Jackson: Ibid.
115 It was a cause for quiet celebration: Ibid.
CHAPTER 12: SERENDIPITY
117 little sister Patricia: Katherine Johnson: Becoming a NASA Mathematician, Leadership Project, March 8, 2010, https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLCwE4GdJdVRLOEyW4PhypNnZIJbYLRTVd&v=jUsyYvrz2qQhttp://www.visionaryproject.org/johnsonkatherine/.
117 vivacious college beauty queen: “Miss Goble Is Bride of Cpl. Kane Jr.,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, August 30, 1952. All details of the bride and groom’s attire, wedding decoration, and honeymoon plans are from this article.
117 still lived in Marion: “Marion, VA Couple Observes Golden Wedding Anniversary,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, September 19, 1953.
118 “Why don’t ya’ll come home with us too?”: “Katherine Johnson: Becoming a NASA Mathematician.”
118 “I can get Snook a job at the shipyard”: Ibid.
118 the director of the Newsome Park Community Center: Katherine Johnson: Becoming a NASA Mathematician.
118 coordinated community activities: “Newsome Park Community Center Dedicatorial Exercises Held,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, July 21, 1945.
119 stayed up nights making school outfits: Johnson interview, March 6, 2011.
119 live-in help: Joylette Hylick Goble, personal interview, October 10, 2011.
120 a painter’s job at the Newport News shipyard: Johnson interview, September 17, 2011.
120 the club’s assistant director: “Joins USO Staff,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, May 9, 1953.
120 nine-year West Computing veteran: “Peninsula Spotlight,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, February 5, 1949.
121 a routine that would persist for the next three decades: Johnson interview, August 27, 2013.
121 modest job rating of SP-3: Katherine Johnson, interview with Aaron Gillette, September 17, 1992.
121 “Don’t come in here in two weeks”: Ibid.
121 “very, very fortunate”: Ibid.
121 three times her salary: Johnson interview, September 17, 2011.
122 initiating a quiet conversation: Johnson interview, September 27, 2013.
122 “The Flight Research Division is requesting two new computers”: Ibid.
122 her new deskmates, John Mayer, Carl Huss, and Harold Hamer: John Mayer, Carl Huss, and Harold Hamer, “Investigation of the Use of Controls During Service Operations of Fighter Airplanes,” NACA Conference on Aircraft Loads, Flutter and Structures, March 2–4, 1953, Langley Aeronautical Laboratory.
122 “picked up and went right over”: Johnson interview, September 27, 2013.
122 the division chief, Henry Pearson: Johnson interview, September 17, 1992; Langley Aeronautical Laboratory Telephone Directory, 1952.
123 got up, and walked way: Johnson interview, September 17, 1992.
124 or she could assume: Ibid.
124 became fast friends: Ibid.
CHAPTER 13: TURBULENCE
125 from the entry level of SP-3 to SP-5: Johnson interview, September 17, 1992.
126 Dorothy was drafted as a consultant: “Computers Help Compile Handbook,” Air Scoop, August 17, 1951.
127 “black-haired, leather-faced, crew-haircutted human cyclone”: “Spotlite by K-P,” LMAL Bulletin, November 30, 1942.
127 The Maneuver Loads Branch conducted research: A great background in the work being done by these groups at the time can be found in W. Hewitt Phillips, A Journey in Aeronautical Research: A Career at NASA Langley Research Center (Washington, DC National Aeronautics and Space Administration, 1998).
128 One of the first assignments: Katherine Johnson: Becoming a NASA Mathematician.
128 into the trailing wake of a larger plane: Ibid.
128 they were fascinated: Ibid.
128 as long as half an hour: Christopher C. Kraft Jr., “Flight Measurements of the Velocity Distribution and Persistence of the Trailing Vortices of an Airplane,” Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, March 1955, NTRS.
129 “one of the most interesting things she had ever read”: Katherine Johnson: Becoming a NASA Mathematician.
129 Langley’s “Skychicks”: Women Computers.
129 didn’t even realize the bathrooms were segregated: Johnson interview, September 17, 1992.
130 refused to so much as enter the Colored bathrooms: Johnson interview, September 17, 1992.
130 bring a bag lunch and eat at her desk: Johnson interview , March 6, 2011.
130 temptation of the ice cream: Ibid.
130 “by the book”: Johnson interview, September 27, 2013.
130 perused Aviation Week: Ibid.
131 some of the black employees: This is a subject that came up more than once during interviews with people who have known her.
131 a black or a white roommate: Katherine Goble Moore, personal interview, July 31, 2014.
131 before coming up with a yes: Johnson interview, September 15, 2015.
131 “I want to move our girls out of the projects”: Moore interview.
131 the federal Housing and Home Finance Agency: “Government Suspends Demolition,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, August 26, 1950.
132 Gayle Street, a cul-de-sac: Colita Nichols Fairfax, Hampton, Virginia (Charleston, VA: Arcadia Publishing, 2005), 69. This provides good background on Hampton’s many black neighborhoods.
133 Mimosa Crescent had expanded: “Mimosa Crescent Project Expanded,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, March 23, 1946.
133 would even get her
own bedroom: Moore interview.
133 located at the base of his skull: Johnson interview, March 13, 2011.
133 James Francis Goble died: “Funeral Services Held for James F. Goble,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, December 29, 1956.
134 “It is very important”: Moore interview.
134 “You will have my clothes ironed”: Ibid.
135 Family lore had it: Hylick interview.
135 would recall their grandfather saying: Ibid.
136 had a long conversation about it: Johnson interview, December 27, 2010.
CHAPTER 14: ANGLE OF ATTACK
137 the American Century: Henry R. Luce, “The American Century,” Life, February 17, 1941, 61–65. Luce, the publisher and founder of Time and Life magazines, penned this influential editorial in February 1941, urging a conflicted America to take a decisive position in World War II and claim its rightful place of power on the world stage. “The world of the 20th Century, if it is to come to life in any nobility of health and vigor, must be to a significant degree an American Century.”
137 bought an “electronic calculator”: “Announce New Research Device,” Air Scoop, March 28, 1947.
137 as many as thirty-five variables: Ibid.
138 would cause an error in all the others: Ibid.
138 easily take a month to complete: Ibid.
138 in a few hours: Ibid.
138 two seconds per operation: Ibid.
138 The whole building shook: Eldon Kordes, interview with Rebecca Wright, JSC, February 19, 2015.
138 then an IBM 650: Theresa Overall, “Mom and IBM,” personal blog, February 15, 2014.
138 destined for the lab’s finance department: Kordes interview.
138 “Let’s run it again!”: Ibid.
139 Dorothy wasted no time enrolling: Ann Vaughan Hammond, untitled biographical sketch of Dorothy Vaughan, undated, in author’s possession.
140 (the students called them “chicken coops”): Teri Kanefield, The Girl from the Tar Paper Shacks School: Barbara Rose Johns and the Advent of the Civil Rights Movement (New York: Harry L. Abrams, 2014).
141 “Not Willing to Wait”: “Not Willing To Wait: NAACP Leaders Want Integration ‘Now!’,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, May 29, 1954.
141 “If we can organize the Southern States for massive resistance”: Benjamin Muse, Virginia’s Massive Resistance (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1956), 22.
141 some of the black employees attended: Johnson, “Fair Employment.”
141 bookkeeping to machine shop theory: “Adult Education Courses Offered,” Air Scoop, February 17, 1956.
142 after he made her the offer: Stradling, “Retired Engineer Remembers Segregated Langley.”
143 clamber onto the catwalk: Golemba, “Human Computers,” 102.
143 published in September 1958: K. R. Czarnecki and Mary W. Jackson, “Effects on Nose Angle 515 and Mach Number on Transition on Cones at Supersonic Speeds,” Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, September 1958.
143 suggested that she enroll: Stradling, “Retired Engineer Remembers Segregated Langley.”
144 sue the University of Virginia: “Kitty O’Brien Joyner,” LAC.
144 only two female engineering graduates in its history: “Woman Engineer Gets Post with RCA Victor Company,” Norfolk Journal and Guide, November 15, 1952.
144 to enter Hampton High School: Stradling, “Retired Engineer Remembers Segregated Langley.”
144 “special permission”: Ibid.
145 in the spring of 1956: Jackson Personnel File.
145 dilapidated, musty old building: Stradling, “Retired Engineer Remembers Segregated Langley.”
146 In general, the black men at Langley: Thomas Byrdsong, personal interview, October 4, 2014.
146 blue-collar mechanics, model makers, and technicians: Ibid.
147 they escaped to a black-owned restaurant: Williams interview.
CHAPTER 15: YOUNG, GIFTED, AND BLACK
149 her daily job: Christine Darden, personal interview, May 3, 2012.
150 she perused the newspapers: Ibid.
151 “Red-Made Satellite Flashes Across U.S”: Daily Press, October 5, 1957.
151 “Sphere Tracked in 4 Crossings Over US”: New York Times, October 5, 1957.
151 “Project Greek Island”: “The Secret Bunker Congress Never Used,” National Public Radio, March 26, 2011, http://www.npr.org/2011/03/26/134379296/the-secret-bunker-congress-never-used.
151 1992 exposé: Ted Gup, “The Ultimate Congressional Hideway,” Washington Post, May 31, 1992.
152 “small ball in the air”: David S. F. Potree, “One Small Ball in the Air: October 4, 1957–November 3, 1957,” NASA’s Origins and the Dawn of the Space Age, Monographs in Aerospace History 10, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, September 1998.
152 many of them, hundreds perhaps: Only years later would the United States learn that the size and capability of the Soviet arsenal was greatly exaggerated. See McDougall, The Heavens and the Earth, 250–53.
153 We can’t let them beat us: Darden interview.
153 Radio Moscow announced: “Reds List Sputnik Time for Little Rock,” Washington Post, October 10, 1957.
154 “I just came to let you all know”: Christine Darden, “Growing Up in the South During Brown v. Board,” Unbound Magazine, March 5, 2015.
154 son of a former fire chief: Steven A. Holmes, “Jesse Helms Dies at 86; Conservative Force in Senate,” New York Times, July 5, 2008.
154 nonexistent science laboratories: Darden, “Growing Up in the South.”
154 they would not be good enough: Ibid.
154 “education, honesty, hard work, and character”: Wini Warren, Black Women Scientists in the United States, 75.
155 Pontiac Hydromatic: Christine Darden, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000), The History Makers, February 26, 2013, http://www.thehistorymakers.com/biography/christine-darden.
155 “What did you learn today?”: Ibid.
155 priming the carburetor: Ibid.
155 tearing out their stuffing: Ibid.
155 acres of cotton fields: Ibid.
156 released in time for the harvest: Ibid.
156 second-grade student: Ibid.
156 “Julia’s parents said she could go”: Ibid.
156 one of the best Negro high schools in the country: Rob Neufeld, “Visiting Our Past: The Allen School in Asheville,” Asheville Citizen-Times, April 27, 2014.
156 Cab Calloway’s niece: Ibid.
156 A 1950 graduate named Eunice Waymon: Martha Rose Brown, “ ‘For Colored Girls’: Professor Researching Former School for African-American Female Students,” Times and Democrat, March 11, 2011.
156 Waves of homesickness: Christine Darden, personal interview, October 10, 2012.
157 Bettye Tillman and JoAnne Smart: “Letters of Intent,” UNCG Magazine, Spring 2010, http://www.uncg.edu/ure/alumni_magazineT2/2010_spring/feature_lettersofintent.htm.
157 “After careful deliberation”: Benjamin Lee Smith, “Report of the Superintendent to the Greensboro City Board of Education regarding Brown v. Board of Education,” 1956. http://libcdm1.uncg.edu/cdm/ref/collection/CivilRights/id/547.
158 “I’ve been accepted at Hampton”: Christine Darden, The History Makers.
158 “Red engineering schools”: Washington Post, February 23, 1958.
158 Soviet engineering grads were female: Ibid. The article reported that at the same time, women were just 1 percent of American engineering graduates.
159 “civilian army of the Cold War”: Sylvia Fries, “The History of Women in NASA, “Women’s Equality Day Address, Marshall Space Flight Center, August 23, 1991.
159 took her breath away: Christine Darden, The History Makers.
CHAPTER 16: WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES
161 the winking dot of light: Katherine G. Johnson, The History Makers, February 6, 2013, http://www.thehistorymakers.com/biography/katherine-g-johnson-42.
161 �
��One can imagine the consternation”: Reference Papers Relating to a Satellite Study, RA-15032 (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corp., 1947); F. H. Clauser, Preliminary Design of a World Circling Spaceship (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corp, 1947).
162 a little too far out: Hansen, Spaceflight Revolution, 17.
162 “backward peasantry”: Roland, Model Research, 262.
162 “First in space means first, period”: McDougall, The Heavens and the Earth.
162 Americans were ahead of the Russians: Ibid., 131.
163 “revolutionary advances for atmospheric aircraft”: W. Hewitt Phillips, A Journey into Space Research: Continuation of a Career at NASA Langley Research Center (Washington, DC: NASA History Office, 2005), 1.
163 ended by a 1958 NACA headquarters edict: Ibid.
163 “dirty word”: Hansen, Spaceflight Revolution, 17.
163 hard-pressed to find books on spaceflight: Chris Kraft, Flight: My Life in Mission Control (New York: Plume, 2002), 63.
164 an advanced version of the X-15 rocket plane: Hansen, Spaceflight Revolution, 356–61.
164 “notoriously freethinking”: Hansen, Spaceflight Revolution, 197.
165 had come online in 1955: Roger Launius, “NACA-NASA and the National Unitary Wind Tunnel Plan, 1945–1965,” 40th AIAA Aerospace Sciences Meeting & Exhibit, January 14–17, 2002, Reno, Nevada, http://crgis.ndc.nasa.gov/crgis/images/d/de/A02-14248.pdf.
165 “nearly every supersonic airplane”: Launius, “NACA-NASA and the National Unitary Wind Tunnel Plan.”
165 downsized to the new office in 1251: Langley Aeronautical Laboratory Telephone Directory, 1956.
168 gave Miriam Mann’s daughter a shiny new penny: Harris interview.
168 Eunice Smith volunteered: “Association Thanks Helpers at Party,” Air Scoop, January 2, 1953.
168 Dorothy Vaughan’s children counted the days: Kenneth Vaughan, personal interview, April 4, 2014.
168 Langley Air Force Base: Mark St. John Erickson, “Colorblind Sword: Military Has Become Model for Race Reform, Experts Say,” Daily Press, July 28, 1998.
169 “Integration anywhere means destruction everywhere”: Donald Lambro, “Pulitzer-winning Journalist Mary Lou Forbes Dies at 83,” Washington Times, June 29, 2009. Archival footage of Almond’s 1958 inaugural speech can be viewed at https://vimeo.com/131577357.
Hidden Figures Page 34