[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 148 (Thursday, September 6, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Page S6052]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      TRIBUTE TO KATHERINE JOHNSON

  Mr. MANCHIN. Mr. President, Today I wish to honor a White Sulphur 
Springs native who not only completed groundbreaking work at NASA 
during the space race, but who also broke the barriers of race and 
gender during a critical time in our Nation.
  Katherine Coleman Goble Johnson was blessed with a natural talent for 
mathematics which far exceeded that of her peers. By the age of 13, 
Katherine was already attending high school on West Virginia State 
College's campus where, in 1937, she received a B.S. in both 
mathematics and French.
  In 1939, when West Virginia began to integrate its graduate schools, 
West Virginia State's president, Dr. John Davis, personally selected 
Katherine and two male students as the first African-American students 
to attend West Virginia University.
  After starting a family, Katherine found work at the West Area 
Computing section of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics' 
Langley laboratory, headed by fellow West Virginian Dorothy Vaughan. 
The 1957 launch of the Soviet satellite, Sputnik, changed history--and 
Katherine's life. Her work on the equations to describe an orbital 
spaceflight in which the landing position of the a spacecraft is 
specified led to Katherine being the first woman recognized as an 
author of a report from the flight research division.
  As NASA prepared for the orbital mission with John Glenn in 1962, 
Katherine was famously asked to run the orbital equations controlling 
the Friendship 7 trajectory by hand in case of a mechanical computing 
error. Katherine has recalled John Glenn saying that, if she said the 
numbers were good, then he was good to go. The mission was a success 
and marked a tremendous turning point in the competition between the 
United States and the Soviet Union in space.
  Katherine's story inspired the book, ``Hidden Figures,'' by Margot 
Lee Shetterly and also the Oscar-nominated film of the same name.
  Recently, 46 of my colleagues and I introduced the Hidden Figures 
Congressional Gold Medal Act, which would award Congressional Gold 
Medals to Katherine, Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, and Dr. Christine 
Darden in recognition for their contributions to NASA's success during 
the space race. In 2015, President Obama awarded her the Presidential 
Medal of Freedom, America's highest civilian honor.
  A bronze statue in Katherine's honor now stands on the campus of West 
Virginia State University. It is my hope that the students who pass it 
every day will be reminded of Katherine's legacy and will be inspired 
to keep their passion for knowledge alive.
  Every one of our female leaders in West Virginia are the epitome of 
strength, leadership, and advancement in their fields. They serve as 
inspiring role models for the next generation, and that is due in great 
part to the women who broke ground in generations past. Because of the 
accomplishments of intellectual leaders such as Katherine, more young 
women have and will blaze their own trails in the fields of science, 
math, engineering, and technology and will continue to make our State 
and entire Nation proud.
  It is an honor to recognize Katherine's legacy and to wish her the 
very best as we celebrate her 100th birthday.

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