And it was a joy to contribute to the literature that was going to be coming out.īut you know, math is the same. I like the stars and the stories we were telling. The main thing is I liked what I was doing. I didn’t do anything alone but try to go to the root of the question – and succeeded there. Yet unlike the white male astronauts she helped launch into space, no one knew of the groundbreaking work Johnson and dozens of other Black women did for NASA and space exploration. Her calculations proved critical to the success of the Apollo Moon landings and the start of the Space Shuttle program. In 1969, she calculated the trajectories of Neil Armstrong’s historic mission to the moon on Apollo 11. Katherine continued to work at NASA until 1986. But when they went to computers, they called over and said, "Tell her to check and see if the computer trajectory they had calculated was correct." So I checked it, and it was correct. You could do much more, much faster on the computer. You tell me when you want it and where you want it to land, and I'll do it backward and tell you when to take off." That was my forte.Įven after NASA had electronic computers, John Glenn requested that Katherine personally recheck the computer calculations before his 1962 Friendship 7 flight – the first American mission to orbit Earth. “I was looking at the television I said, ‘Boy, I hope he’s got that right.’ And I was sitting there hoping I’m right too,” she laughed.Īs NASA concluded when President Obama awarded Johnson, now 97, the Presidential Medal of Freedom: “Not bad, for a little girl from West Virginia, who coincidentally (or maybe not) was born on August 26: Women’s Equality Day.As a human computer, Katherine calculated the trajectory for astronaut Alan Shepard’s 1961 Freedom 7 mission to space – the first spaceflight for an American.Įarly on, when they said they wanted the capsule to come down at a certain place, they were trying to compute when it should start. If he missed it by a degree, he doesn’t get into orbit.” While the world watched Neil Armstrong take the first steps on the moon on July 20, 1969, Johnson said, “we were really concerned when they were leaving the moon, going back. Johnson said her proudest achievement was figuring the launch window for Apollo 11. President Obama awards Katherine Johnson the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He requested that Johnson check the math. Her reputation was such that when John Glenn was preparing for his first orbital flight in 1962, he didn’t trust the calculations made by NASA’s new electronic computers. Johnson’s math mapped the flight of Alan Shepard, who became the first American in space in 1961. But Johnson questioned the policy, and got a spot at the table. Born Katherine Coleman in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. Johnson ’s gift for numbers allowed her to accelerate through her education. She was told women didn’t attend high-level meetings with engineers and flight researchers. Katherine Johnson graduated from college at age 18. Katherine Johnson, 97, was instrumental in every major NASA space program from Mercury to the space shuttle.
The all-male space flight research group requested her for their team. But her mathematical skills and strategic thinking quickly made her indispensable. There, Johnson was expected to simply plug numbers into other engineers’ formulas all day. She finished college at age 18.Īfter a stint as a schoolteacher, she got a job as a “computer” in 1953 at what would become NASA. When she had taken every advanced mathematics course at West Virginia State College, professors created new courses for her. At the age of 10, she started secondary school. Johnson always seemed to outgrow her classes. Johnson’s calculations were instrumental in every major space flight program, from Mercury to Apollo to the space shuttle.
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