![]() ![]() Black mathematicians, however, were segregated in their own office and loaned out to various divisions as needed. However most of the women enjoyed their work and were much better paid than female employees elsewhere. Whereas men with similar qualifications were classified as professionals, the women were sub-professionals. They used slide rules and mechanical calculators to perform complex calculations on wind-tunnel experiments. Before the age of electronic computers, NACA employed hundreds of women mathematicians as human computers. Johnson began her career as a "human computer" at the National Advisory Committee on Aeronautics (NACA), NASA's predecessor, at the Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. After her first husband's death she married James A. After moving to Newport News, Virginia, she worked as a substitute teacher and as program director for the local United Service Organizations (USO). She taught math, and occasionally French, at various high schools in Marion and Morgantown, West Virginia. Johnson married James Goble, and they had three daughters. Over the next three years she did graduate work in mathematics and physics at West Virginia State. At that time, I was very interested in French and English studies…but Professor Evans said, ‘I know how good you are in French, but you will also major in mathematics.’" So Johnson majored in both mathematics and French, graduating summa cum laude in 1937. Johnson told Warren: "Our teachers made such a difference-all my teachers and professors were very supportive and nurturing…James Carmichael Evans, was one of my math teachers in college-his wife had taught me math in the eighth grade-and because they didn't have children at the time, I became a kind of child to them…To please him I always had to do my very very best…. Johnson's high-school and college teacher Angie Turner King a major influence. Their mother kept house for them in Institute while their father stayed at his job at the Greenbriar Hotel in White Sulphur Springs.Īs at other historically black schools, mentoring students was a major focus at West Virginia State. Institute was an all-black town with many well-educated residents and the Colemans attended the college's laboratory high school. She told Wini Warren in 1996 that "education was the primary focus in our family." Since White Sulphur Springs did not have a high school, each September Katherine, her sister, and two brothers moved to Institute, West Virginia, the home ofWest Virginia State College. Katherine Coleman was born on August 26, 1918, in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. An early computer expert, Johnson was considered to be one of the most brilliant mathematicians at NASA. The following year she helped bring the ill-fated Apollo 13 safely back to Earth. In 1969 her work was instrumental in landing men on the moon. She determined the trajectories for America's first manned space flights in 19. Katherine Johnson was a pioneer scientist at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
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