The-good-names-are-gone Submitted: Important

Remember the Women Who Made #Apollo50th Possible

As the world celebrates the 50th anniversary of the historic Moon landing, we remember some of the women whose hard work and ingenuity made it possible. The women featured here represent just a small fraction of the enormous contributions made by women during the Apollo era. 

Margaret Hamilton, Computer Programmer

Margaret Hamilton led the team that developed the building blocks of software engineering — a term that she coined herself. Her systems approach to the Apollo software development and insistence on rigorous testing was critical to the success of Apollo. In fact, the Apollo guidance software was so robust that no software bugs were found on any crewed Apollo missions, and it was adapted for use in Skylab, the Space Shuttle and the first digital fly-by-wire systems in aircraft.

In this photo, Hamilton stands next to a stack of Apollo Guidance Computer source code. As she noted, “There was no second chance. We all knew that.”

Katherine Johnson, Aerospace Technologist

As a very young girl, Katherine Johnson loved to count things. She counted everything, from the number of steps she took to get to the road to the number of forks and plates she washed when doing the dishes.

As an adult, Johnson became a “human computer” for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, which in 1958, became NASA. Her calculations were crucial to syncing Apollo’s Lunar Lander with the Moon-orbiting Command and Service Module. “I went to work every day for 33 years happy. Never did I get up and say I don’t want to go to work.“

Judy Sullivan, Biomedical Engineer

This fabulous flip belongs to biomedical engineer Judy Sullivan, who monitored the vital signs of the Apollo 11 astronauts throughout their spaceflight training via small sensors attached to their bodies. On July 16, 1969, she was the only woman in the suit lab as the team helped Neil Armstrong suit up for launch.

Sullivan appeared on the game show “To Tell the Truth,” in which a celebrity panel had to guess which of the female contestants was a biomedical engineer. Her choice to wear a short, ruffled skirt stumped everyone and won her a $500 prize. In this photo, Sullivan monitors a console during a training exercise for the first lunar landing mission.

Billie Robertson, Mathematician

Billie Robertson, pictured here in 1972 running a real-time go-no-go simulation for the Apollo 17 mission, originally intended to become a math teacher. Instead, she worked with the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, which later became rolled into NASA. She created the manual for running computer models that were used to simulate launches for the Apollo, Skylab and Apollo Soyuz Test Project programs. 

Robertson regularly visited local schools over the course of her career, empowering young women to pursue careers in STEM and aerospace.

Mary Jackson, Aeronautical Engineer

In 1958, Mary Jackson became NASA’s first African-American female engineer. Her engineering specialty was the extremely complex field of boundary layer effects on aerospace vehicles at supersonic speeds.

In the 1970s, Jackson helped the students at Hampton’s King Street Community center build their own wind tunnel and use it to conduct experiments. “We have to do something like this to get them interested in science,” she said for the local newspaper. “Sometimes they are not aware of the number of black scientists, and don’t even know of the career opportunities until it is too late.”

Ethel Heinecke Bauer, Aerospace Engineer

After watching the launch of Sputnik in October 1957, Ethel Heinecke Bauer changed her major to mathematics. Over her 32 years at NASA, she worked at two different centers in mathematics, aerospace engineering, development and more. 

Bauer planned the lunar trajectories for the Apollo program including the ‘free return’ trajectory which allowed for a safe return in the event of a systems failure  — a trajectory used on Apollo 13, as well as the first three Apollo flights to the Moon. In the above photo, Bauer works on trajectories with the help of an orbital model.

Follow Women@NASA for more stories like this one, and make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.

I loooove the centrifuge for so many reasons but this sound it makes is the biggest one

Lyft just offered me free credits to break the strike this week.

There’s a lyft / uber strike planned this week from 7am to 9pm on Wednesday May 8th. I got a notification this morning that every ride taken this week gives me credit on future rides. I found that tempting but then remembered why they are doing it - to encourage folks to cross a picket line. I for one won’t be taking advantage of this offer, as I stand in solidarity with people utilizing their right to free speech to bargain for better working conditions.

Consider this a friendly reminder to those who follow me that this is happening, and I hope you’ll support the apps’ drivers in their quests for better pay.

There are a lot of absolute idiots in the comments saying things like “a good dog will never hurt a baby” and “the child is never to blame if the dog attacks” and “special snowflakes call everything abuse”

Listen here you fucktards: dogs. Are not. Fucking. People. They don’t operate by human logic. They don’t follow human moral codes. It has nothing to do with it being a “good dog“ or not. If you were getting hit and pulled on and punched and scratched constantly, you just might react. A dog can’t speak up and say “hey please stop that you’re hurting me“. What he can do is move, lunge, bite, etc. These actions might intentionally or unintentionally harm your child. Use your fucking head and don’t let your kid beat up on your dog no matter how many times he’s “taken it” before; you never know when he might snap. Don’t teach your kids it’s OK to treat animals like punching bags and they’ll never react. That’s immensely unfair to both the animal and the child. You could have a hurt or dead child and a euthanized dog because you were fucking dumbass who thought the dogs were just there to be treated like toys.

Same goes for cats and any other pet. Teach your child how to properly treat animals or don’t have any fucking animals.

here’s a studyzai ✨ reblog for an easy and peaceful start to the school year!

A Wolf Called Romeo by Nick Jans

One day in Juneau, Alaska, a black wolf appeared out in the open of a snowy field while Nick Jans (photographer and author) was outside his back porch with his pet Labrador. Usually, wolves do not encounter humans, so when he first saw the wolf, he was in shock and in fear. His dog, however, went out to greet the black wolf. It turned out that the wolf was being friendly. The Labrador and wolf started to play together as Nick captured the exciting moment on his camera. The black wolf earned the name “Romeo” because of his playfulness toward the humans and other dogs. Everyone was skeptical of the wolf at first. Soon they realized that the wolf was no harm to the townspeople and the other dogs. The black wolf had an understanding that creating a friendship and bond with the humans and dogs would bring harmony to the species. The wolf visited the townspeople for six years until one day, he was shot by a couple of poachers visiting from outside the state. It was a very tragic event. After the event, the townspeople held a memorial to remember Romeo. Nick eventually wrote a book about the friendship between Romeo and him.

“Romeo and Nick shared a bond that was probably what the first humans who domesticated dogs felt about their dogs. More than about building trust, it was about understanding need for friendship that even the wildest animal feels.”

Video

Heard some important information on Twitter today, and thought I’d post it here for anyone who may not have heard it. This is actually a thing, devised by human rights organisation called Karma Nirvana.

Reblog to save a life?

If we’re all going down I'm going the way I lived, making shitty memes in the face of peril.

Petitions that still need signatures:

Justice for George Floyd

Justice for Breonna Taylor

Justice For Joāo Pedro

Justice For Emerald Black

Justice For Tony McDade

Justice for Belly Mujinga

Exoneration of Albert Wilson

Justice for Amiya Braxton

Justice for Tete

Justice for Jennifer Jeffley

Justice For Darrius Stewart

Justice for Crystal Mason

Justice for Sean Reed

Justice for Tamir Rice

Justice for Sean

Justice for Dion Johnson

Free Siyanda

Justice For Alejandro Vargas Martinez

Willie Simmons has served 38 years for a $9 robbery

Reopen Kendrick Johnson’s Case

Justice for Cameron Green

Justice for Young Uwa

Justice For Amari Boone

Justice for Rashad Cunningham

Julius Jones is innocent. Don’t let him be executed by the state of Oklahoma

Disbarment of George E. Barnhill

Free Jefferson Elie

Justice for Dafonte Miller

Justice for Andile Mchunu

Justice for Tazne Van Wyk

Reopen Sandra Bland’s case

Fire Racist Criminal Michael J Reynolds from the NYPD

Justice for Ahmaud Arbery- Pass Georgia Hate Crime Bill

Justice For Regis Korchinski-Paquet

Justice for Angelesea Rock

Free Anthony Wint

Justice for James Scurlock

Reopen the case involving the death of Tamla Horsford

Fire Jared Campbell

Justice for Ashton Dickson

Justice for Collins Khosa

Justice For Mubarak Soulemane

Justice for Sherrie Walker

Justice for Jonas Joseph

Justice for Elijah McClain

Pardon Black Woman Imprisoned for Voting

Arrest Juan DelaCruz for the murder of Pamela Turner

National Action Against Police Brutality

Dismiss the charges on Marshae Jones and charge the one who shot her and her unborn baby

Ban the use of inhumane rubber bullets