Description
The mission of THE HUMAN COMPUTER PROJECT is to recover the histories of the pioneering female mathematicians who worked at the NACA and NASA during the early days of aeronautics and the space program, offering narratives that transform our perception of the roles of women, particularly minority women, in science and technology, and in society at large. We believe that one of the most effective ways to provide context for many contemporary problems, including the dearth of diversity in science and technology employment, is one of the oldest and most intuitive: storytelling. With the story of the “Colored Computers” at the Hampton, VA-based Langley Research Center (then the Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory) as its nucleus, the project recovers this important but largely untold 20th century episode, offering new insights into the points of intersection between the Cold War, the Space Race, the struggle for gender equality and the Civil Rights movement.
