Dorothy Vaughan
Born: September 20, 1910, Kansas City, Missouri
Died: November 10, 2008, Hampton, Virginia
Dorothy Jean Johnson Vaughan was a mathematician and human computer who worked for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), subsequently NASA, at the Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. When she was appointed as acting supervisor of the West Area Computers, she became the first black female supervisor in NACA. At that time NACA was segregated and the women of the West Area Computers were obliged to use a separate cafeteria and separate bathrooms from their white colleagues. She prepared her human computer group for the advent of electronic computers by first learning the Fortran programming language herself before teaching it to the human computer group. She was one of the women included in the book, Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly, and the subsequent movie of the same name. In 2019, Vaughan was posthumously awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.
Vaughn was born Dorothy Jean Johnson to Annie and Leonard Johnson in Kansas City Missouri. When she was 7, the family moved to Morgantown, West Virginia. In 1925 she graduated high school as its valedictorian, and with a full academic scholarship she attended Wilberforce University, Ohio. She graduated with a BA in mathematics in 1929. In 1932, she married Howard Vaughn and moved to Newport News, Virginia. They had six children, two girls and four boys. Her husband died in 1955.
Vaughn was a mathematics teacher for 14 years in Farmville, Virginia. Her school was segregated during this time. In 1943 she started work for NACA in their West Area Computing unit. This was a group of black female human computers, who performed complex calculations for aerospace engineers on the aerodynamics of flight and for the early space program. These calculations were performed by hand or assisted by the mechanical calculators of that time. In 1949 she was appointed as the acting supervisor of the unit, the first black female supervisor in NACA. She served in this role for years before her position was made permanent.
Anticipating the arrival of electronic computers, Vaughn taught herself FORTRAN before teaching it to other members of her group. When NASA was formed in 1958, NACA and Vaughn were absorbed into the new agency. Under NASA segregation was abolished as was the West Area Computing unit. Vaughn never received a managerial position at NASA. She retired in 1971 after 28 years at NACA and NASA.
Dorothy Vaughn died on November 10, 2008, aged 98. She was survived by four of her children, ten grandchildren and fourteen great-grandchildren. She left a pioneering legacy of women, particularly black women, in mathematics and engineering. She featured in the book and movie, Hidden Figures.