Hidden Figures - Margot Lee Shetterly

mid-1960s, leaving her a single mother
and the head of her household at a time
when the majority of white women still
didn’t work outside the home.
In 1981, Langley sent Mary Jackson to
NASA headquarters in Washington, DC,
for a year of training to become an equal
opportunity specialist. Mary had already
decided who should follow her as
Langley’s Federal Women’s Program
Manager. Though Gloria didn’t come
from a technical background, her military
upbringing and fifteen years of
experience at NASA gave her an
understanding of the business of
engineering and the motivations of the
engineers. She knew airplanes better than
a lot of the engineers she worked with.
She was also a quick study with
computers: Mary Jackson taught her how