Helene Rother
AUTOMOBILE ENGINEER (1909 - 1999)
Born in 1908 in Leipzig, Germany, her creativity and
artistic ability were influenced by the community.
Rother began her career illustrating books. After first
fleeing to France to avoid the Nazis, Rother and her
daughter escaped to Northern Africa as refugees.
From there, Rother voyaged to the United States,
and in 1942 was hired by General Motors as one of
the first women automotive designers. Her focus
was on upholstery colours and fabrics, lighting, door
hardware and seats and her artistic and creative
vision was to advance bland interior styling into
something more stylized than the bland post-war
cars. Eventually, Rother left GM and began her own
design studio in 1947. Her artistic vision opened the
door to a new era of automotive design,
transforming the basic look of vehicle interiors to
something more elegant. She became the first
woman to address a gathering of the Society of
Automotive Engineers. Historians gave her the
nickname "The Godmother of Automotive Design."
Mary Jackson
AREOSPACE ENGINEER (1921 - 2005)
Mary Winston Jackson was an African American
mathematician and aerospace engineer at the
National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics
(NACA), in 1958 succeeded by NASA. She
worked at Langley Research Center for most of
her career. She started on computing at the
segregated West Area Computing division,
then took advanced engineering classes and in
1958 became NASA's first Black female
engineer. After 34 years at NASA, Jackson had
earned the most senior engineering title
available. She could not earn further promotions
without becoming a supervisor. She accepted a
demotion to become a manager of both the
Federal Women's Program, in the NASA Office
of Equal Opportunity Programs, and of the
Affirmative Action Program. In this role, she
worked to influence both the hiring and
promotion of women in NASA's science,
engineering, and mathematics careers.
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