03214cam a2200337 4500 759151690 TxAuBib 20160822120000.0 160511s2016||||||||||||||||||||||||eng|u 2016021050 9780062363596 hardcover $27.99 006236359X hardcover $27.99 (OCoLC)950004289 DLC eng rda DLC OCLCF UPZ MOF ON8 ZHB FM0 OCLCO TxGR TxAuBib Lee Shetterly, Margot, author. Hidden figures [Book] : the American dream and the untold story of the Black women mathematicians who helped win the space race / Margot Lee Shetterly. First edition. New York, NY : William Morrow, [2016] xviii, 346 pages ; 24 cm. Includes bibliographical references (pages 273-328) and index. A door opens -- Mobilization -- Past is prologue -- The double V -- Manifest destiny -- War birds -- The duration -- Those who moved forward -- Breaking the 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. 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."-- adapted from publisher website. 20160822. 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. RV8