"From a very young age, Katherine Johnson counted everything--thenumber of dirty dishes she'd washed, the steps she walked to church, and even the number of leaves on the trees. By 1928, she was so intelligent and skilled at math that she was able to skip several grades and start high school at age ten. And while Katherine had to dealwith racism, segregation, and prejudice throughout her life, she did not let this hold her back from becoming a mathematician. In 1953,she started working as a 'human computer' at America's space agency, now known as NASA. Katherine calculated complex equations by hand,and these calculations helped astronauts travel safely into space. She was a part of many important missions, including the Apollo 11 mission that put the first person on the moon"--