CHAPTER ONE NASA'S SECRET Annie Easley and the other five women computers hurried through the building eager to see the photograph that had been taken for an upcoming open house The photograph of all six women at work was enlarged so visitors could get a view of what they did each day As computers they performed mathematical calculations for the engineers at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA Lewis Research Center in Cleveland Ohio When the women saw the photo one of the other computers turned to Easley and apologized Oh Annie they cut you out of the picture The fact that something was cut from the photograph wasn't surprising Photographers crop anything that looks out of place or might Annie Easley played an important part at NASA as a computer but the agency treated her as lesser because of her skin color
steal the viewers focus DATE UNKNOWN from the central image It is hard to say exactly when in the photo This time Annie Easley was cropped from the photograph of the the photographer cropped Computer Services Division at the Lewis Research Center out Easley the only black Easley did not mention the woman working alongside exact date in the interview she gave NASA historians but five white women Easley she started working at the lab in 1955 so the event must spoke to her supervisor have taken place sometime also a woman about what after that had happened Oh I don't blame you she said I'd be upset too I didn't feel like I'm a Although Easley had minority I'm out here to do a job and I knew I had her supervisor's sympathy the ability to do it and that's nothing was done At that where my focus was on getting the job done I was time there was no Office not intentionally trying to be a of Diversity and Equal pioneer Opportunity Today this Annie Easley NASA computer office is responsible for ensuring NASA gives all employees the same opportunities When Easley was cropped from the group photo there were no laws that made this type of discrimination illegal and there was no one to follow up on a complaint of this kind Just like that Easley was removed from view and hidden away
Human Computers Today's electronic computers process and save vast amounts of information Scientists use these machines to make predictions about the weather and the spread of disease and to record the genetic makeup of a wide variety of plants and animals The first computers were very different from those of today because they were human beings These people did computations completing complex calculations before there were calculators or other electronics to help get the job done In the 1700s the first computers worked in astronomy Both men and women ran numbers to solve problems for European astronomers scientists who study the stars and planets These computers helped the astronomers calculate the paths of planets and comets orbiting the sun They estimated when these celestial bodies would complete an orbit and when each object would reach certain points in its orbit It could take weeks or months for a computer to solve a problem and it cost a lot of money to pay a computer to work so many hours Scientists could not always afford the services of these computers but the military could By the 1800s computers were still calculating the movements of the stars the planets and the moon but they were doing it to aid ship captains with navigation Because this work
