Hidden Figures - Margot Lee Shetterly

middling chance of success: though Neil
Armstrong handicapped the odds of
returning to Earth safely at 90 percent, he
thought they had only a 50-50 chance of
landing on the Moon on the first go.
Katherine Johnson had confidence: she
knew her numbers were right, and she
assumed that everyone else—Marge
Hannah and the fellas there in her office,
Mary Jackson and Thomas Byrdsong and
Jim Williams, everyone from the top of
NASA to the bottom—had given their all
to the mission.
Besides, Katherine always expected
the best, even in the most difficult of
situations. “You have to expect progress
to be made,” she told herself and anyone
else who might ask. It had taken more
than a decade of data sheets and plotting,
IBM punch cards and long days and