Being female was hard enough, but being a black female with ambitions to design spacecraft was beyond challenging in her day!
'Herstory': the history of her struggle, is brought to life in the popular movie HIDDEN FIGURES based on the biography of three friends over as many decades in their overlapping careers at NACA which would become the National Aeronautics and Space Administration featured in the movie.
Called a 'computer' for their uncanny talents to calculate numbers and serve as research mathematicians, there was a segregated department where these ladies worked and faced the challenges of gender bias and racial prejudice. Her focus was data analysis from wind tunnel experiments and real world aircraft flight experiments. She came to master air flow, including thrust and drag forces, in order to improve American planes.
She would become NASA's first black female engineer but after 34 years she realized she would need to take a demotion in order to achieve greater recognition and promotions. As a manager of both the Federal Women's Program in the NASA Office of Equal Opportunity Programs AND the Affirmative Action Program, she worked to influence the hiring and promotion of women in NASA'S STEM careers.
The Hollywood history version does not reveal her significant role in advancing the careers of others nor does it expose her 30 years as a Girl Scout Leader who helped young black children to become scientists, engineers and mathematicians.
The movie is based on the book by Margot Lee Shetterly. Jackson is portrayed in the film by Janelle Monae.