Short of just gushing about the brainy women featured in this engaging book, I'll say that I wish I could have known some of these women. Coming from a STEM background myself, I found it fascinating to hear about the personal and the professional lives of the women who worked at NACA (before it was known as NASA). Three of these women are followed in detail: Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson and Katherine Johnson. They, and all the other West Computers, worked unbelievably hard and with often flawless accuracy, and were responsible for calculating the math for the designs of numerous planes and missiles, and for getting men into orbit and to the moon.
The author describes the women's personal struggles from the Second World War to the 1960s against a background of racism (Jim Crow and all its ugliness of segregation and humiliation and the growing Civil right movement). In fact, it's impossible to talk about any aspect of these women's lives without discussing the racism and misogyny that circumscribed their efforts to improve their and their families' lives. Margot Lee Shetterly never lets you forget the atmosphere of the times, and all the big and the little things that stood in the way of African Americans.
That said, these women were extraordinary. They were big brains, incredibly determined and worked hard to ensure the correctness of their work. One thing that also came through in Shetterly's book is the sense of community and support the West Computers had for each other. Everyone gained from each step forward, each new freedom, each new achievement.
These women were critical to improvements the US made to its defense during wartime and later to its efforts in the Cold War. And the efforts and examples of these women carried on to following generations women and men in NASA. I'm so glad that I got a chance to learn of some of their stories.
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On a separate note, I recently saw the movie, and alternately cried and laughed.