Gretchen worked in a factory that produced material used in filters for automobiles, air conditioners, and other items where filters were necessary to trap dust particles. The filters were made by winding a fine filament around a drum to form a mat. While the...
John Langdon Down was born in 1828 in England. He was the youngest of seven children. As a young teen, he became an apprentice to his father, the village apothecary, and decided he wanted to follow a scientific career. When he was 18, he met a young girl who would...
Margot Stern was born in Chicago in 1941. She was five when her family moved to Memphis, and her experience growing up in a Jewish family in the Jim Crow South became a crucible time in her life. As a child she saw the unjust policies of exclusion, like the zoo...
Gordon Parks was born in Kansas in 1912. He had 14 older siblings. His formal education began in a segregated elementary school. His high school was integrated, but African American students were limited in their participation in school activities. One of...
Virginia McLaurin was born in 1909 in South Carolina. She grew up in the Jim Crow era in the South and only went to school through the third grade. She was needed in the fields, working with her parents. Virginia married when she was 13. She was part of the Great...
Few people believed in Yvonne Brill’s scientific potential. Her high school teacher told her that a woman would never succeed in a science career. Her father wanted her to stay and be a store keeper in their hometown of Winnipeg. She wasn’t allowed to study...
Nora Stanton Barney (née Blatch) was born in England in 1883. She attended high school in New York City, traveling back to England for the summers. When she was 19, her family moved to the United States permanently. Her grandmother was Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the...
As the United States ventured into space, NASA realized that the space suits worn by astronauts were critical to mission success. As early as 1947, the military had developed suits for pilots which were partially or fully pressurized. But these were considered...
Ildaura Murillo-Rohde was born in Panama in 1920 and came to the U.S. when she was 25. She completed a nursing diploma, and her first nursing job was at a hospital in San Antonio, Texas. She was surprised to find that there were few Hispanic nurses in the hospital...
Imagine you’re at the grocery store. You are getting ready to put your purchases into a paper bag. The bag is narrow and the bottom comes to a point like an envelope. The bag burst with just a few items. You think to yourself, there must be a better way. That’s...
