NASA & Women Can Be Proud of This Story & More

Rating: 8/10 (27 November 2017)

This is a very good movie. Even better is there is factual basis for the story of the early NASA space program. Is it entirely factual? Not totally, but close enough. There are a few things changed by the screen writers, the true story speaks for itself-
"Hidden Figures is based off of the nonfiction book Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race, written by historian Margot Lee Shetterly. Shetterly's book is fantastically well- researched, walking readers through the social and political world in which Johnson, Vaughan, and Jackson lived, and telling a detailed narrative of their lives and the work they accomplished."
The males in the story ironically are the ones where reality is stretched. Kevin Costner and Jim Parsons characters are scripted different from the real people. That is done for more effective dramatic effect. The positive messages from the film do reverberate. "From now on there are only one color of people at NASA." Great message which I wish would infect more people.
John Glenn's - " Get the girl to do it. I want this human computer to check the output of the electronic computer, and if she says they're good, you know, I'm good to go as part of one of my pre- flight checklists," might just be the most amazing real story. It exposes that a computer is only as good as what the programmer has put into it. When new data first becomes known, the computer can not possibly put it out until it is in there. This is why computer projections still get proved wrong all the time.
This is a great example of how team work was needed to get this country going on JFK's "New Frontier". While the story has happened before in history it can never be illustrated better than it is here.
As for it happening prior, before World War 2, a company named EA Link developed and manufactured flight simulators to train many of the pilots who flew in the war for the Allies. A lessor known group of 7 Women who worked at Link were known as their "Flight Simulator Ladies" who helped build these essential training devices. Their stories have been sort of lost to history. While this NASA story is accurately recorded in this film, the parallels of importance in both groups of women are important.
Women were the first programmers of ENIAC, the first Computer ever built. There were 8 women, now all deceased who did this too. That was made into another movie.
Hollywood is catching up making films about women's contributions in history. It is a good thing women took action before waiting to become famous by leading the way in these and other important events in history.