Source: Hidden Figures / Hidden Figures
A Salt Lake City school named after President Andrew Jackson will soon change it’s name to honor Mary W. Jackson, an African American woman pioneer in the U.S. space program. A unanimous vote by the Salt Lake City School District Board of Education on Tuesday night, makes the change the first time a school in Utah’s capital city to be named after a woman.
Mary Jackson was NASA’s first black female engineer in 1958. Her story is among those recounted in the book “Hidden Figures” and 2016 film of the same name.
Andrew Jackson, the seventh U.S. president, was known in part for the role he played in extending slavery into Western territories during the early 1800s.
