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All the United States Washington, D.C. Hidden Figures Way
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Hidden Figures Way

A street in front of NASA's D.C. headquarters has been named in honor of the Black women who were essential to early spaceflight.

Washington, D.C.

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Fred Cherrygarden
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Hidden Figures Way   NASA/Joel Kowsky / Public Domain
Hidden Figures Way.   Fred Cherrygarden / Atlas Obscura User
The NASA headquarters facility named after Mary Jackson.   Fred Cherrygarden / Atlas Obscura User
Mary Jackson working at the Langley Research Center, 1977.   Fred Cherrygarden / Atlas Obscura User
The NASA headquarters.   Fred Cherrygarden / Atlas Obscura User
Hidden Figures Way   Jason Michael Walker / Atlas Obscura User
Space man   Jason Michael Walker / Atlas Obscura User
Inside HQ   Jason Michael Walker / Atlas Obscura User
Tribute wall   Jason Michael Walker / Atlas Obscura User
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Since 1992, the headquarters building of NASA has stood at 300 E Street SW in Washington, D.C., a nine-story office complex running the overall operations of the agency. It's a far cry from the Goddard Space Flight Center or other research facilities across the country, rarely on the itineraries of those visiting D.C. as tourists.

But if you happen to walk in front of it, your eyes are bound to catch an unconventional street name written on the sign: "Hidden Figures Way." And those who are au fait with modern cinema might remember a biographical drama film with that title, which gathered a great deal of critical praise and even three Oscar nominations in 2017, including one for Best Picture.

Based on the nonfiction book of the same name by Margot Lee Shetterly, the film focuses on a trio of Black women mathematicians working for NASA in the 1960s: Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, and Mary Jackson, portrayed by Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, and Janelle Monáe, respectively. While Johnson is the best-known of the three, for calculating flight trajectories for both Project Mercury and Apollo 11, Mary Jackson became the namesake for the renamed NASA headquarters in 2020 to pay tribute to her achievement.

The strip of E Street in front of the building was also renamed in the year prior to it, after Shetterly's book that gave international recognition to the previously "hidden" figures of NASA history. It does not only honor the three mathematicians featured in her book and the film adaption but also all the women who blazed the trail for progress in gender equality as well as in space exploration.

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Space Exploration Women's History Street Names Film Nasa

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The sign is across E Street from NASA Headquarters at the corner of E Street (Hidden Figures Way) and 4th Ave.

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Added By

Fred Cherrygarden

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DenverApplehans, Michelle Cassidy, Jason Michael Walker

  • DenverApplehans
  • Michelle Cassidy
  • Jason Michael Walker

Published

October 4, 2022

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  • https://www.nasa.gov/feature/sign-of-progress-street-renaming-puts-nasa-headquarters-on-hidden-figures-way
Hidden Figures Way
300 E St SW
Washington, District of Columbia, 20546
United States
38.883065, -77.016279
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