Nichelle Nichols' daunting task to launch a national blitz for NASA, recruiting 8,000 of the nation's best and brightest | dG1fSlNka0pQUms3dDg
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00 [VIDEO PLAYBACK]
00:03 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:06 - What is a change in society?
00:08 A change is you cannot even imagine a world any other way.
00:13 - For most of the world, Nichelle Nichols
00:15 is Lieutenant Uhura, pop culture icon.
00:19 But what they don't know is that she changed the space program
00:22 forever.
00:24 - The astronaut corps was really kind of the old boys club.
00:26 It was all white Anglo-Saxon male.
00:29 - Oh, I dreamed of becoming an astronaut.
00:31 But NASA said that women weren't being considered for the job.
00:35 - The argument was made that there were
00:36 no qualified black people.
00:38 - When is America going to put a woman in space?
00:40 When is America going to put a black person in space?
00:42 - We could have done it if they would just let us.
00:45 - I resented that and decided I was
00:48 going to do something about it.
00:50 - And she's saying--
00:52 - Where are my people?
00:56 - That was the spark that caused NASA to say,
00:59 how do we go about this?
01:00 - I challenged everyone to answer the question.
01:03 And NASA said, how about Lieutenant Uhura?
01:07 - Ms. Nichols has gone from science fiction to science fact.
01:13 - I will bring you so many qualified people.
01:16 The world will never be the same again.
01:18 - This is your NASA.
01:23 - She went into it to be an actress.
01:25 She ended up changing the world.
01:27 - I think it's one of the most fantastic stories to be
01:29 told to the American people.
01:31 - The world got to see that our women are strong, yes,
01:34 but they're also smart.
01:37 - We owe a great debt of gratitude to Michelle Nichols.
01:41 - All I can do is think of Michelle Nichols
01:43 as a force of nature.
01:46 - I said, if they let me in the door, I will open it so wide,
01:51 they will see the world.
01:53 [MUSIC PLAYING]
01:56 [MUSIC PLAYING]
02:00 (gentle music)