Mae C. Jemison[1] is a Renaissance woman if there ever was one—a woman with many talents and a woman who utilizes them all.

Family support boosted Mae to many milestones including onto the NASA launching pad on September 12, 1992 when she and six other astronauts were launched aboard the Endeavour for an eight-day mission in space.

Not bad for a girl born in Decatur, Alabama in 1956, the daughter of a roofer and a school teacher. Mae’s sister (Ada Jemison Bullock) became a child psychiatrist and her brother Charles Jemison became a real estate broker. How’s that for some topnotch parenting and a first rate sibling support system!

Mae’s educational résumé includes winning a National Achievement Scholarship to Stanford University where she danced in theater groups and was the head of the Black Student Union before graduating with a chemical engineering degree. Then she entered Cornell University and earned her M.D. Mae also studied abroad in Cuba and Kenya.

Later, Mae served in the Peace Corps for two and a half years as a medical officer in Sierra Leone and Liberia. Maybe travels to far-off lands and all her work, studies and service were not exciting enough for Mae. Or maybe it was her early enchantment by Lieutenant Uhura on “Star Trek.” For Mae gave up her medical career in the mid-80s to pursue her highest dream—to fly in space!

This takes guts, obviously, but even more in Mae Jemison’s case since the ill-fated launch of the Challenger in 1986 occurred right before she made history. Mae C. Jemison became the first African-American woman accepted into NASA’s astronaut training program. And, after years of training, Mae was the first African-American woman to fly in space.

Mae reached a personal milestone at a Trekkie event when she met Nichelle Nichols[2] who played her hero on TV. We expect the feeling was mutual for Ms. Nichols when she met a real astronaut—one whom she had inspired to reach for the stars.

Mae said, “I realized I would feel comfortable anywhere in the universe because I belonged to and was a part of it, as much as any star, planet, asteroid, comet or nebula.”


Image: NASA photo of astronaut Mae C. Jemison (photo in public domain)[3]

[1] See her biography at: http://www.biography.com/people/mae-c-jemison-9542378

[2] See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nichelle_Nichols

[3] See Wikipedia photo information: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dr._Mae_C._Jemison,_First_African-American_Woman_in_Space_-_GPN-2004-00020.jpg