![]() Morehouse, Tuskegee University (then Tuskegee Institute) and other historically Black schools were cranking out physicists, scientists and mathematicians every year, but many did not apply to NASA. Though it was Johnson’s use of analytic geometry that helped bring John Glenn back to Earth, she was among the few Black heroes who toiled, unsung, behind the scenes at NASA, where only three percent of 19,000 employees were Black in 1961. Schools and scholarship funds named after Lawrence have vanished, and with Lawrence’s most avid crusaders of his legacy gone (his wife, mother and other relatives), the legacy of a man who inspired many Blacks to dream big has faded over five decades.īefore the release of the movie, “Hidden Figures,” many Blacks were unaware of the historic contributions of Black NASA mathematicians Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson and Dorothy Vaughan. Once a celebrated pilot who flew over 2,500 miles, Lawrence today is rarely honored on the same level as other NASA astronauts who have gone on the ultimate mission. Lawrence’s struggle remains the same in death as it was in life: getting recognized as an astronaut at NASA.ĭespite campaigns and efforts to recognize his contributions, Lawrence’s legacy is drifting like a wayward space satellite. Robert Lawrence’s contributions to NASA reinvigorated Black America, but there won’t be any ceremonies and special events to mark the 50th Anniversary of his untimely death. This year marks the 50th Anniversary of the deaths of four astronauts, but NASA and America have remembered the three astronauts in the Apollo 1 disaster as heroes, with special commemorations, while Lawrence remains a forgotten pioneer whose memory has been lost. The accident happened just 11 months after an electrical fire aboard a rocket in flight killed three Apollo I astronauts on Jan. Poor and Black, Lawrence faced tremendous odds against breaking into the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) lily-white stratosphere, but when he did, he became America’s first Black astronaut.īlack pride turned to sorrow after Lawrence was killed in a jet crash at Edwards Air Force Base in California. Lawrence’s launching pad was his hometown of Chicago, where he blasted through high school and graduated at just 16 years old. ![]() First Black Astronaut Remains a Forgotten Pioneer - The Washington Informer Close
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