Who is the author of Rise of the Rocket Girls?

The author of Rise of the Rocket Girls is Nathalia Holt.

Biography & Memoir

Rise of the Rocket Girls Book Summary - Rise of the Rocket Girls Book explained in key points

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Name: Rise of the Rocket Girls
Rating: 4.5 (20 reviews)
Author: Nathalia Holt

Nathalia Holt

The Women Who Propelled Us, from Missiles to the Moon to Mars

4.5 (20 ratings)

19 mins

Brief summary

Rise of the Rocket Girls by Nathalia Holt tells the story of the women who worked at NASA in the 1940s and 50s, and their role in the space race. It highlights the challenges they faced and their contributions to the success of NASA.

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Space Women's Stories

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Rise of the Rocket Girls
Summary of 8 key ideas

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Key idea 1 of 8

What’s in it for me? Learn about the women behind the space program.

Despite the many forward steps in feminism and the women’s rights movement, many people are still oblivious to the role that women played in the space program’s early years during the 1950s and 1960s. What’s worse, there are still people out there who think women can’t “do” science.

Most history books and movies about space focus on the astronauts in space and the male engineers in the control room, but the truth is that intelligent and driven women were a central force in making all those male accomplishments possible. It doesn’t matter that they went unseen and unrecognized at the time. Today, we recognize that their impact was astronomical.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

that electronic computers once paled in comparison to human ones;
that not having an engineering degree didn’t stop women from working on space missions; and
how much women’s work in space exploration has gone unrecognized and uncelebrated.

Barbara Canright was the first of the female computers to work at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

In 1939, after winning a grant from the National Academy of Sciences, a rambunctious trio of friends – Ed Forman, Frank Malina and Jack Parsons – founded the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, or JPL, at the California Technical Institute. Among the first people they hired were Barbara and Richard Canright.

Barbara and Richard had met at Caltech, where Richard was a graduate student and Barbara was a typist. This is also where Richard first met the founders of JPL.

As the name suggests, JPL was a laboratory that created jet engines. One of the early plans was to build a jet engine that could quickly propel an airplane off the ground, the hope being to speed up launching procedures and shorten runways.

JPL pursued this goal in a pretty straightforward manner, essentially just strapping powerful rockets onto small planes. Rockets were something that fascinated the team at JPL. Yet the word “rocket” was strongly associated with science fiction at the time, so, to sound professional and scientific, they claimed that their experiments dealt strictly with jet engines.

These experiments required a lot of calculations, which is where Barbara Canright came in. She was a math whiz and could expertly crunch numbers to measure force and propulsion. Since there were no automated computers in the 1940s, it all had to be done by hand. A single experiment might take a week of calculations and fill up to eight notebooks.

And so it wasn’t long before JPL started recruiting a new computing team to help Mrs. Canright with calculations. Two more female computers came on board: Virginia Prettyman and Macie Roberts. Interestingly, in those days the term “computer” was still used for people rather than machines as they were the ones who did the computing!

Roberts was soon promoted to supervisor and charged with hiring new employees, and she set about establishing a female computer team. This was not a typical move in the early 1940s. Most places wouldn’t put a woman in charge of hiring and managing her own all-female division within an engineering department. But JPL wasn’t a typical place.

JPL expanded rapidly and soon began working on military rockets.

It took a fair few crashes – thankfully none of them fatal – and explosions to get there, but, finally, on August 12, 1941, JPL successfully managed to reduce the length of an airplane's takeoff by 50 percent.

It was good timing, too. The United States entered World War II just a few months later, and JPL won a lucrative contract from the US Army.

While developing missiles for the army, JPL simultaneously laid the groundwork for space exploration.

Soon after JPL created the propellant mix nicknamed “Jack’s cake,” it began working on the army’s Corporal missile project. The idea was to create a guided rocket that could carry a large warhead.

But JPL didn’t stop there. While developing the missile, the JPL team used the opportunity to research advanced rockets that could one day travel even farther. They dreamt of discovery, not weaponry.

The success of Jupiter-C was bittersweet, but it all counted in the space race.

JPL’s engineers were a diverse bunch of female computers. Among them were Helen Yee Ling Chow, whose computations led to Jupiter-C’s success, and Janez Lawson, JPL’s first African-American employee. Thanks to their efforts, JPL's Jupiter-C rocket was able to break free from Earth’s gravitational pull.

But their efforts were overshadowed just a year later.

In the 1960s, JPL set its sights on the moon, but electronic computers weren’t much help.

The Explorer success cemented JPL’s reputation. They became the go-to lab for space exploration.

When the US government decided the space program should be kept separate from the military, they signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act in 1958. The act created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and JPL became one of its primary research and development groups.

The Voyager and the Viking missions were highpoints for the computing team at JPL.

Plotting a safe trajectory to Venus was hard. But it was nothing compared to the challenge of the Grand Tour. The plan was to send a probe through the entire solar system, using the planets’ gravitational pulls – all while using as little fuel as possible.

The precise calculations required for that task were astronomical in scale.

In the seventies, it wasn’t just computers that advanced at JPL. Feminism finally started to make an impact.

Viking 1 reached Mars on June 19, 1976, helping engineers and scientists glean previously unimaginable knowledge about Mars. This initial mission paved the way for programs in later decades, like the Mars Pathfinder and the Mars Exploration Rover missions. These led to an even deeper understanding of the mysterious red planet.

But the 1970s saw advances beyond space missions. The women’s liberation movement was also making significant contributions to gender equality.

The women at JPL are critical to NASA’s continued success.

As we’ve seen, ever since the United States first turned its explorative gaze to the stars, the women at JPL have been there, making vital contributions. Though many have since retired, their contributions are still felt.

For instance, the Deep Space Network (DSN) that Sue Finley built and maintained remains the main line of communication for US space missions.

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What is Rise of the Rocket Girls about?

Rise of the Rocket Girls (2016) reveals the intriguing and enlightening stories of the women who worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It traces the laboratory from its earliest days through to modern times, from its quirky beginnings to its role as one of NASA’s most important component parts. These women were responsible for crunching numbers and the important calculations that kept the United States in the space race and helped launch rockets, satellites and probes into the farthest corners of the solar system. Their influence cannot be denied. And, more than that, it must be acknowledged.

Rise of the Rocket Girls Review

Rise of the Rocket Girls (2016) by Nathalia Holt is a captivating account of the remarkable women who played a crucial role in the early days of NASA's space program. Here's why this book is worth reading:

The book sheds light on the often overlooked contributions of these unsung heroes, offering a fresh perspective on the history of space exploration.
Through interviews, research, and personal stories, the author brings these women to life, showcasing their intelligence, tenacity, and passion for science.
With its fascinating anecdotes and behind-the-scenes details, the book paints a vivid picture of the challenges these women faced and the groundbreaking work they accomplished.

Who should read Rise of the Rocket Girls?

Readers who seek strong female role models
Science geeks
Space enthusiasts

About the Author

Nathalia Holt’s work has been featured in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Popular Science and the Atlantic. She spent years speaking to the women of JPL and compiling their stories. She is also the author of Cured: The People who Defeated HIV.

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Biography & Memoir

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