Mary Jackson was born on April 9th, 1921 in Hampton, Virginia. She went to her local all-black school in Hampton, she graduated with the highest honors from George P. Phoenix Training School in 1937. She earned her education from B.S., Mathematics and Physical Science, Hampton Institute, 1942. She graduated college with a degree in Math and Physical Science.
After college, she began teaching as a math teacher in Calvert County, Maryland at an all-black school. During World War Two, Hampton had become a large home front effort. Mary returned home and became a receptionist at the King Street USO Club. This served the city’s African American population. She worked many other jobs including: working as a clerk for the Hampton Institute’s Health Department, time spent at home after the birth of Levi, her son, and finally working as an Army secretary at Fort Monroe. In 1951, she was recruited by NACA, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics.
Mary started as a research mathematician at the Langley Memorial Aeronautical Laboratory’s segregated West Area computing section in 1951,
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Czarnecki encouraged her to enter a training program that would allow her the promotion she needed. This meant that she would have to take graduate courses in physics and math in after work courses (night classes). Managed by the University of Virginia, but held at the all-white Hampton High School. This means that she would have to have special permission from the City of Hampton to attend these courses. Mary petitioned and was able to take these classes. She completed the courses and earned the promotion, and in 1958 became NASA’s first black female engineer. She also co-authored her first report, Effects of Nose Angle and Mach Number on Transition on Cones at Supersonic Speeds, in the same year of her