Format:
Book
Author:
Shetterly, Margot Lee
Title:
Hidden figures : the American dream and the untold story of the Black women mathematicians who helped win the space race / Margot Lee Shetterly.
Edition:
First edition.
Publisher, Date:
New York, NY : William Morrow, c2016.
Description:
xviii, 346 pages ; 24 cm
Summary:
"Before John Glenn orbited the earth or Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, a group of dedicated female mathematicians known as "human computers" used pencils, slide rules and adding machines to calculate the numbers that would launch rockets, and astronauts, into space. Among these problem-solvers were a group of exceptionally talented African American women, some of the brightest minds of their generation. Originally relegated to teaching math in the South's segregated public schools, they were called into service during the labor shortages of World War II, when America's aeronautics industry was in dire need of anyone who had the right stuff. Suddenly, these overlooked math whizzes had a shot at jobs worthy of their skills, and they answered Uncle Sam's call, moving to Hampton, Virginia, and the fascinating, high-energy world of the Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory. Even as Virginia's Jim Crow laws required them to be segregated from their white counterparts, the women of Langley's all-black "West Computing" group helped America achieve one of the things it desired most: a decisive victory over the Soviet Union in the Cold War, and complete domination of the heavens."--Publisher's description.
Subjects:
United States. National Aeronautics and Space Administration -- Officials and employees -- Biography.
Women mathematicians -- United States -- Biography.
African American women -- Biography.
African American mathematicians -- Biography.
Space race.
Genre:
Biographies.
Notes:
Includes bibliographical references (pages [319]-328) and index.
Contents:
A door opens -- Mobilization -- Past is prologue -- The double V -- Manifest destiny -- War birds -- The duration -- Those who move forward -- Breaking barriers -- Home by the sea -- The area rule -- Serendipity -- Turbulence -- Angle of attack -- Young, gifted, and black -- What a difference a day makes -- Outer space -- With all deliberate speed -- Model behavior -- Degrees of freedom -- Out of the past, the future -- America is for everybody -- To boldly go.
LCCN:
2016021050
ISBN:
9780062363596 (hardcover)
006236359X (hardcover)
9780062363596
Other Number:
950004289
System Availability:
4
Current Holds:
0
# Local items:
4
Control Number:
636621
Call Number:
510.925 Shetterl
Course Reserves:
0
# Local items in:
2
# System items in:
2