As part of the 100 years birthday celebration for Katherine Johnson, West Virginia State University has unveiled a statue of her.

The honour bestowed on her by her Alma mater in recognition of her ground breaking achievement many years ago, is one of the many that has been unfolding since she clocked 100 on 6th of August.

Johnson, who is referred to as ‘human computer’, helped calculate the trajectory for the May 5, 1961 space flight of Alan Shepard, the first American in space. She also calculated the launch window for his 1961 Mercury mission and plotted backup navigation charts for astronauts in case of electronic failures.