In honor of one of the agency’s “Hidden Figures”, NASA officially names their Washington DC headquarters after their very first African-American female engineer, Mary W. Jackson. Mary Jackson began her career with NASA in 1958 at a time when female engineers were a rarity. Unable to advance her career due to systemic inequalities, she instead focused her energy on mentoring other Black women to help them get ahead. She worked hard to impact the hiring and promotion of the next generation of all of NASA’s female mathematicians, engineers and scientists. Her dedication to this cause has made it possible for women of color to overcome the barriers of segregation and gender bias.
