Hidden Figures - Margot Lee Shetterly

degree in education and pursue teaching,
the most stable career for a black woman
with a college degree.
Through an extensive grapevine, black
colleges received calls from schools
around the country requesting teachers,
then dispatched their alumni to fill open
positions in everything from tar paper
shacks in the rural cotton belt to
Washington, DC’s elite Dunbar High
School. New educators hoped to teach in
their major subject, of course, but would
be expected to assume whatever duties
were necessary. After graduation in
1929, Dorothy was sent forth like a
secular missionary to join the Negro
teaching force.
Her first job, teaching math and
English at a Negro school in rural
Tamms, Illinois, ended after her first