The 2016 film Hidden Figures depicts the untold story of three brilliant African American female mathematicians – Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson – who played pivotal roles at NASA during the early days of the U.S. space program. One memorable scene in the movie shows Katherine Johnson, played by Taraji P. Henson, having to run across the NASA campus to use the restroom in a separate building because there were no bathrooms available for black women in the one where she worked. This raises the question – is that bathroom scene true to life or was it dramatized for the film?
Racial Segregation at NASA in the 1960s
To understand the context of the bathroom scene in Hidden Figures, it’s important to know about the state of racial segregation at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia in the early 1960s when these events took place. Although NASA was at the forefront of advanced research, the facility was still subject to the racial segregation laws and cultural norms of the time.
Many public facilities at Langley were segregated by race, including bathrooms, cafeterias, and computing sections. Signs marked “Colored Computers” designated a separate work area for African American female mathematicians like Katherine Johnson. In her memoir “Reaching for the Moon”, Johnson recalled, “I didn’t feel the segregation at NASA, because everybody there was doing research. You had a mission and you worked on it, and it was important to you to do your job…and play bridge at lunch.” However, the bathroom situation was a clear reminder of the racial divides that persisted.
Katherine Johnson’s Daily Routine
In the film, Katherine Johnson is depicted as having to make a nearly half mile trek from her desk in the space capsule aeronautics section to the segregated West Area Computing unit each time she needed to use the restroom. Her coworker’s stunned, “You walk that far every day?” helps establish how absurd and unfair the situation was in contrast to her white colleagues who could use closer, whites-only bathrooms.
While that lengthy walk was likely dramatized for the movie, Johnson did indeed have to go to a different building to use the restroom due to the segregated facilities. Mary Jackson, one of the other mathematicians, also recalled having to use restrooms that were farther away from her desk across the campus. Their white counterparts could use closer bathrooms in the same building they worked in. The separate and unequal access to facilities was the norm until Langley eventually integrated its campus in the mid 1960s following nationwide civil rights legislation.
NASA’s Transition to Integration
Although NASA, as a federal government agency, was not legally bound to racial segregation, it still lagged behind on integration even after changes began happening elsewhere in the country in the 1950s and early 1960s. By 1958, all federal facilities were officially desegregated following orders from President Eisenhower. However, many areas of NASA remained unofficially segregated for years afterwards.
It took concerted efforts by civil rights activists and black professionals at NASA to push for change through official grievances. The first successful racial discrimination complaint against NASA facilities was filed in 1960 regarding segregated cafeterias. Over the next few years, more facilities integrated, including the bathrooms and computing groups. After the 1964 Civil Rights Act, all segregation at NASA was unequivocally ended. The scenes in Hidden Figures provide insight into what that experience was like as the racial barriers began falling down.
Impact on Katherine Johnson’s Work
The indignity and inconvenience of the segregated NASA facilities took a toll on Katherine Johnson and the other African American staff in their daily working life. Having to walk far to use the bathroom not only wasted valuable time, but made it more difficult for Johnson to collaborate with her colleagues. However, her perseverance and expertise – as depicted in the film – helped her overcome those obstacles and make history through her accomplishments.
Johnson’s technical work at NASA was not affected by the facilities she was or wasn’t allowed to use. Her extraordinary mathematical and analytical skills made her indispensable to the Space Task Group on pioneering spaceflight missions including Alan Shepherd’s first American manned mission in 1961 and John Glenn’s orbital mission in 1962, among others. She was said to often be “borrowed” for these critical projects. Her accurate orbital calculations were relied upon by Glenn himself to ensure a safe flight.
Johnson’s brilliance and determination to succeed despite the racial barriers places her as a central, pioneering figure at NASA during the early space age. The bathroom scene in Hidden Figures provides just one glimpse into the everyday discrimination she overcame in the midst of her groundbreaking work.
Lasting Significance Today
The struggle for equal rights and integration at NASA has lasting significance that still resonates today. The bathrooms themselves that Katherine Johnson and Mary Jackson were forced to use have been preserved as a monument to their achievements and the changes they helped spur. In 2017, NASA officially dedicated the West Computing area, including bathroom F-1158, as a national historic landmark.
NASA facilities manager Bill Barry explained the reasoning behind memorializing this site: “It’s important that we recognize how laws segregated people and restricted opportunity based on race or gender, but it’s also important that we understand what people persevered to obtain equal rights. That history belongs to all of us. It’s part of the American fabric.”
The story of these pioneering women achievers and the challenges they faced highlights the broader fight for civil rights and workplace equality that continues today. NASA leader Charles Bolden emphasized Katherine Johnson’s lasting legacy this way: “She stands for everything we want our children to aspire to: bravery, courage, and excellence.” The bathroom scene depicts a moment on her path to greatness.
Conclusion
In conclusion, while the daily half mile walk to the bathroom in Hidden Figures may have been slightly dramatized, the core issue of Katherine Johnson and her colleagues having to use segregated facilities far removed from their workspaces was true. Official NASA policy did not mandate racial segregation, but it was still the reality there until activists and professionals pushed for change in the early 1960s. Recognizing that struggle honors the perseverance of those black women achievers and serves as an important reminder today that equal rights and inclusion had to be fought for, often one person and one act at a time.