Robert harrison nasa hidden

In the first trailer for the upcoming 20th Century Fox movie "Hidden Figures," Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson and Dorothy Vaughan find themselves stuck on the side of an empty country road as an officer pulls up behind their car.

"We are just on our way to work, at NASA," says Johnson, portrayed by Taraji P. Henson.

"I had no idea they hired—" the cop begins to reply, before being cut off by Vaughan (Octavia Spencer). [NASA Facility Dedicated to Mathematician Katherine Johnson]

"There are quite a few women working in the space program," she says, before he can react to the color of their skin.

Chances are, most people watching the movie trailer today are like that officer, at least in one regard — unaware of the roles that African-American women played in the early days of the space race — even though the events depicted in "Hidden Figures" occurred more than half a century ago.

The movie, which the trailer notes is "based on the untold true story," dramatizes the story of Vaughan, Johnson and Jackson who were among the black women hired to work at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, as "computers," before that title came to refer to inanimate electronic devices.

Working in then stil segregated South, alongside the space agency's male — and mostly white — engineers, the women calculated the data from wind tunnel tests and devised the trajectories needed to send America's first astronauts into space.

Johnson, in particular, gained some fame after John Glenn requested she "check the numbers" that were generated by a room-size IBM computer that was meant to guide his flight as the first U.S. astronaut to orbit the Earth.

"You know what we're doing here?" queries Kevin Costner, playing the fictional Al Harrison, a NASA manager. "We're putting a hu

American aerospace engineer (1913–2000)

Robert Rowe Gilruth (October 8, 1913 – August 17, 2000) was an American aerospace engineer and an aviation/space pioneer who was the first director of NASA's Manned Spacecraft Center, later renamed the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center.

He worked for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) from 1937 to 1958 and its successor NASA, until his retirement in 1973. He was involved with early research into supersonic flight and rocket-powered aircraft, and then with the United States human spaceflight program, including the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs.

Biography

Early life

Gilruth was born October 8, 1913, in Nashwauk, Minnesota, and moved to Duluth when he was nine years old. He graduated in 1931 from Duluth Central High School. As a teenager, Gilruth was fascinated by aeronautics and spent time building model airplanes. He was inspired to pursue a career in the field after reading about NASA's Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory in Virginia. Gilruth received a Bachelor of Science degree in Aeronautical Engineering at the University of Minnesota in 1935, and received his Master of Science degree in 1936. While there he was a member of the Professional Engineering Fraternity Theta Tau, of which he was later inducted as a Hall of Fame Alumnus.

Flight test career

In January 1937 Gilruth was hired at NACA's Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory, where he

2016 film by Theodore Melfi

This article is about the film. For the book on which it is based, see Hidden Figures (book).

Hidden Figures is a 2016 American biographicaldrama film directed by Theodore Melfi and written by Melfi and Allison Schroeder. It is loosely based on the 2016 non-fictionbook of the same name by Margot Lee Shetterly about three female African-American mathematicians: Katherine Goble Johnson (Taraji P. Henson), Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer), and Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe), who worked at NASA during the Space Race. Other stars include Kevin Costner, Kirsten Dunst, Jim Parsons, Mahershala Ali, Aldis Hodge, and Glen Powell.

Principal photography began in March 2016 in Atlanta, Georgia, and wrapped up in May 2016. Other filming locations included several other locations in Georgia, including East Point, Canton, Monroe, Columbus, and Madison.

Hidden Figures had a limited release on December 25, 2016, by 20th Century Fox, before going wide in on January 6, 2017. The film received positive reviews, with praise for the performances (particularly Henson, Spencer and Monáe), the writing, direction, cinematography, emotional tone, and historical accuracy, although some argued it featured a white savior narrative. The film was a commercial success, grossing $236 million worldwide against its $25 million production budget. Deadline Hollywood noted it as one of the most profitable releases of 2016, and estimated that it made a net profit of $95.5 million.

The film was chosen by the National Board of Review as one of the top ten films of 2016 and received various awards and nominations, including three nominations at the 89th Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It also won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture.

Plot

Katherine Goble works at the West Area of Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, in 1961, alongside her colleague