Katherine Johnson was born on August 26, 1918 in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. From a young age her parents and others around could see she was a very bright child. She was one of three African American Students to attend West Virginia State University, with her being the only female. After college, she became a teacher at an African American public school in Virginia. Throughout her life, Katherine Johnson has racked up quite the list of accomplishments. Though, her journey to becoming one of the most famous computer scientists to this date is when she took a job at NASA's West Computing Groups, a group made of many very intelligent African American women like Katherine. These women were known as human computers and their job was to analyze data and provide computations vital to NASA's Space Program. Johnson was then moved to the Space Task Program where she was able to launch the first man into orbit, verified calculations for the Mercury Projects. For the Mercury Projects, the lead astronaut, John Glenn, requested Johnson to do the work. Additionally, she did the calculations for the Apollo 11 Mission which sent the first three men to the moon. She would retire from NASA in 1968. For her work and contributions at NASA, she would be awarded the Congressional Gold Medal, Presidential Medal of Freedom, a Snoopy Award, and a Nasa Group Achievement Award. To learn more about her story, you can watch "Hidden Figures" which talks about Katherine and two other women, all three of them were able to change history for the better. Katherine was able to stay determined throughout her career, even while facing discrimination and racism from those around her, without her perseverance, the world of computer science would not have been the same.
