NASA is renaming its headquarters after Mary W. Jackson, the agency’s first African American female engineer who helped inspire the story behind the book and film “Hidden Figures.”
The news comes amid renewed calls for equality following the death of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man who died at the hands of Minneapolis police in late May. His death, along with that of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky, sparked nationwide demonstrations calling for justice and an end to police brutality.
Jackson began her career with NASA at the segregated West Area Computing Unit of the agency’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, NASA said.
