OUR COMMITMENT TO DIVERSITY

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that Edward T. Welburn was the first African-American designer to join GM (General Motors) in 1972. He was later named the Director of GM's Advance Design in 1998. He and his team are responsible for the designs that changed Cadillac and Buick as we know it today! He rose to be the VP of GM Design North America on October 1, 2003 until his retirement on July 1, 2016.

Interesting Fact:
John Chavis was the first known black person to receive their college degree from Washington and Lee University in 1799. Additional facts: He was born a free person, he enlisted in the Continental Army in 1778, originally enrolled in the College of New Jersey (now known as Princeton University) in 1792, then transferred to Washington and Lee and received his degree in ministry with honors. Mr. Chavis became the first black preacher licensed by the Presbyterian Church in the U.S in 1800 and ministered to a black and white congregation. He contined to serve as a minister until 1832 when he was forced to leave the profession after North Carolina passed a series of laws barring blacks from certain professions. To learn more about John Chavis, click here.

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that the modern development of crop rotation was perfected by George Washington Carver? Carver already had great successes in the laboratory and the community. He taught poor farmers that they could feed hogs acorns instead of commercial feed and enrich croplands with swamp muck instead of fertilizers. His idea of crop rotation proved to be most valuable. Through his work on soil chemistry, Carver learned that years of growing cotton had depleted the nutrients from soil, resulting in low yields. But by growing nitrogen-fixing plants like peanuts, soybeans and sweet potatoes, the soil could be restored, allowing yield to increase dramatically when the land was reverted to cotton use a few years later. To further help farmers, he invented the Jessup wagon, a kind of mobile (horse-drawn) classroom and laboratory used to demonstrate soil chemistry. Click here to learn more about this pioneer!

Interesting Fact:
Have you seen the movie Hidden Figures? Did you know the movie was based on Katherine Johnson's mathematical calculations of orbital mechanics. Johnson was called upon to do the work that she would become most known for (Obrital Mechanics). The complexity of the orbital flight had required the construction of a worldwide communications network, linking tracking stations around the world to IBM computers in Washington, Cape Canaveral in Florida, and Bermuda. The computers had been programmed with the orbital equations that would control the trajectory of the capsule in Glenn’s Friendship 7 mission from liftoff to splashdown, but the astronauts were wary of putting their lives in the care of the electronic calculating machines, which were prone to hiccups and blackouts. As a part of the preflight checklist, Glenn asked engineers to “get the girl”—Johnson—to run the same numbers through the same equations that had been programmed into the computer, but by hand, on her desktop mechanical calculating machine. “If she says they’re good,’” Katherine Johnson remembers the astronaut saying, “then I’m ready to go.” Glenn’s flight was a success, and marked a turning point in the competition between the United States and the Soviet Union in space. Here you will find her full story.

Interesting Fact:
In the 1940s and 1950s, Chinese-born physicist Chien-Shiung Wu, Ph.D., was instrumental in the developing field of atomic science. This included the Manhattan Project: the code name for research into atomic weapons during World War II. Specifically, she improved existing technology for the detection of radiation and the enrichment of uranium in large quantities. Following the war, Wu’s research focused on beta decay, which occurs when the nucleus of one element changes into another element. In 1956, theoretical physicists Tsung Dao Lee, Ph.D. and Chen Ning Yang, Ph.D. asked Wu to devise an experiment that would prove their theory on beta decay. Wu did exactly that, but did not receive the 1957 Nobel Prize along with Lee and Yang—one of many examples of her work being overlooked. An early advocate for women in STEM, Wu spoke at a symposium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1964, famously telling the audience, "I wonder whether the tiny atoms and nuclei, or the mathematical symbols, or the DNA molecules have any preference for either masculine or feminine treatment.” To learn more about Professor Chien-Shiung Wu, click here.

Interesting Fact:
Throughout her 30-year career, Filipino American physician and pediatric immunologist Katherine Luzuriaga, M.D., has made significant contributions to our understanding of persistent viral infections in children. In addition to developing one of the early diagnostic tests for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection in children, Luzuriaga also conducted clinical research into antiretroviral therapies (ART) labelled for use in children. In 2014, Luzuriaga and her colleague Deborah Persaud, M.D., were credited with being behind the first well-documented case of an HIV-infected child being functionally cured of the infection (meaning that the toddler showed no signs of the disease or detectable levels of virus—that is, without detectable levels of virus and no signs of disease, even without taking ART). “Despite the fact that research has given us the tools to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV, many infants are unfortunately still born infected. With this case, it appears we may have not only a positive outcome for the particular child, but also a promising lead for additional research toward curing other children,” NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, M.D. said in a 2014 news release from the National Institutes of Health. Want to learn more about Katherine Luzuriaga M.D.? Click here.

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that there are more than 300,000 living Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander American veterans. The Library of Congress's Veteran's History Project honors those veterans who have shared their stories. Please click here to leare more!

Intersting Fact:
Born in the Philippines, Larry Itliong immigrated to the United States in 1929 at the age of 15 and immediately began working as a laborer, up and down America’s West Coast, as well as in Alaska. By 1930, he joined striking lettuce pickers in Washington, and spent the next several decades working as a labor organizer and eventually, a union leader—including forming the Filipino Farm Labor Union in 1956.

In 1965, Itliong and some of his union colleagues organized the Delano Grape Strike: a walkout of 1,500 Filipino grape-pickers demanding higher wages and improved working conditions. As the movement gained momentum, Delores Huerta and Cesar Chavez from National Farm Workers Association joined Itliong and the Filipino Farm Labor Union. Eventually, the two groups combined to form the United Farm Workers, and the strike ended in 1970—but not before making major strides for agricultural workers, regardless of ethnicity.

"We got wage increases, a medical plan for farm workers, we set up five clinics, a day care center and a school," Huerta said in an interview.

Ildaura Murillo-Rohde, PhD, RN (1920-2010): Changing the face of nursing “The Hispanic whirlwind” — that’s what Ildaura Murillo-Rohde was dubbed for her work as a powerhouse advocate, nurse, therapist, and educator.

Born to a family of health professionals in Panama, Murillo-Rohde studied nursing at the Medical and Surgical Hospital School of Nursing in San Antonio, Texas, where she was dismayed by how few Hispanic nurses were available to serve a large Hispanic population. After graduating in 1948, she went on to pursue several other degrees in education and psychiatric nursing, including a PhD from NYU in 1971.

Over her career, Murillo-Rohde wrote about a broad range of issues from single parenthood to same-sex couples. She also reached several professional heights, including becoming the first Hispanic dean of nursing at NYU.

But one of her greatest achievements was creating the National Association of Hispanic Nurses (NAHN) in 1975. She felt strongly that the country needed an organization to attract Hispanic people to nursing as well as to support their unique concerns and those of the communities they served.

“I saw that I was the only Hispanic nurse who was going to Washington to work with the federal government, review research and education grants, etc.,” Murillo-Rohde later noted. “I looked behind me and thought: ‘Where are my people?’”

For her creation of NAHN and numerous other leadership roles, the American Academy of Nursing named Murillo-Rohde one of their living legends in 1994.

Severo Ochoa, MD (1905-1993): Unraveling RNA

Severo Ochoa’s interest in biology was sparked by his idol, Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist and fellow Spaniard Santiago Ramón y Cajal. Decades later, Ochoa would himself enter the halls of Nobel fame.

Ochoa graduated from the University of Madrid’s medical school in 1929 and then pursued cutting-edge research in several different countries. In 1942, he took a position at the New York University (NYU) College of Medicine, where he remained for more than 30 years.

Ochoa’s resume spans several domains of biochemistry and molecular biology, from photosynthesis to vitamin B’s function in the body. It has been said that in 1931, Ochoa fell in love twice: with his future wife and with the study of enzymes.

Ochoa’s discovery of an enzyme that can synthesize ribonucleic acid was a vital advance in the breaking of the human genetic code. In recognition of his work, in 1959 he became the first Hispanic American to win the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine.

In accepting the prize, Ochoa expressed gratitude for his mentors, students, and adopted country. But mostly he lauded science’s place in elucidating fundamental questions. Though “we may never find the clue to the nature or the meaning of life,” he said, “we may look forward with confidence and anticipation to a much better comprehension of many of its riddles.”

José Celso Barbosa, MD (1857-1921):
An independent Puerto Rican José Celso Barbosa faced discrimination more than once in his lifetime. But the same determination that propelled him past those obstacles allowed him to help countless others.

In 1875, encouraged by his aunt, “Mama Lucia,” Barbosa left Puerto Rico for New York City to further his education. A brush with pneumonia there spurred his interest in medicine, but admissions officials at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons rejected his application.

The letter refusing him read, “At a faculty meeting held last night it was decided not to receive students of color.”

Barbosa was undeterred. In 1880, he graduated with honors from the University of Michigan as the first Puerto Rican to receive a medical degree in the United States.

Barbosa went on to care for soldiers during the Spanish-American War through the Red Cross and to treat many poor patients across Puerto Rico. Barbosa even articulated a need for employer-based health care insurance, which was a radical idea at the time.

Later in his career, Barbosa founded a party that urged U.S. statehood for the island. For that leadership, Barbosa has been dubbed the “father of the Puerto Rican statehood movement.”

Did you know the color TV was invented by Guillermo Gonzalez Camarena, a Guadalajara, electrical engineer? His was the first color TV patented in the US and Mexico and is still used by NASA today.

Born in Perú, Claudio Castillón Lévano invented the "neonatal artificial bubble", designed to improve the intensive medical care of high-risk newborns.

Victor Ochoa was a Mexican inventor and revolutionary who patented the electric brake in 1907. It uses magnetic attraction to make it easier for trains to slow down. Ochoa is also known for inventing the ochoaplane, an adjustable wrench, and a pen and pencil clip, among other inventions.

Hércules Florence, a French-Brazilian inventor, is considered one of the pioneers of photography, developing a photograph some three years before Louis Daguerre.

Dr. Domingo Liotta was born in Argentina, the son of Italian immigrants. In 1969, he created the first artificial heart to be successfully transplanted into a human being. His creation is on display at the Smithsonian Museum.

Carlos Juan Finlay, MD (1833-1915): Solving the yellow fever mystery Yellow fever is a horrible disease, causing such terrifying symptoms as bleeding from the mouth, vomiting, and organ failure. By the late 1800s, intermittent outbreaks had taken some 150,000 lives in the United States, and in Cuba, where Carlos

Finlay was born, it was a near-constant terror.

Finlay's dogged efforts would help change that.

After graduating from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1855, Finlay was drawn to numerous topics, but he found none so compelling as exploring the cause of yellow fever.

At the time, experts thought they knew the culprit: filth in the air or on clothing. Finlay, on the other hand, noticed intriguing correlations between yellow fever epidemics and increases in the mosquito population.

In 1881, he presented his mosquitos-as-vectors theory to scientific conferences in Havana and Washington, D.C. — and was met with ridicule. In 1898, the United States wrested Cuba from Spain in the Spanish-American War, but its troops suffered more deaths from infectious diseases than from combat. Desperate, the U.S. Army turned to Finlay for help and was able to greatly reduce outbreaks by applying some of his ideas about mosquito control, such as destroying larvae in stagnant water.

Finlay’s insights enabled the completion of the Panama Canal, which had been disrupted repeatedly by outbreaks. William Gorgas, MD, who headed public health efforts there and would later serve as U.S. surgeon general, expressed great admiration for Finlay’s thinking. In fact, he called it “the best piece of logical reasoning that can be found in medicine anywhere."

José Celso Barbosa, MD (1857-1921):
An independent Puerto Rican José Celso Barbosa faced discrimination more than once in his lifetime. But the same determination that propelled him past those obstacles allowed him to help countless others.

In 1875, encouraged by his aunt, “Mama Lucia,” Barbosa left Puerto Rico for New York City to further his education. A brush with pneumonia there spurred his interest in medicine, but admissions officials at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons rejected his application.

The letter refusing him read, “At a faculty meeting held last night it was decided not to receive students of color.”

Barbosa was undeterred. In 1880, he graduated with honors from the University of Michigan as the first Puerto Rican to receive a medical degree in the United States.

Barbosa went on to care for soldiers during the Spanish-American War through the Red Cross and to treat many poor patients across Puerto Rico. Barbosa even articulated a need for employer-based health care insurance, which was a radical idea at the time.

Later in his career, Barbosa founded a party that urged U.S. statehood for the island. For that leadership, Barbosa has been dubbed the “father of the Puerto Rican statehood movement.”

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that Cable Supsension Bridges are an invention of the Inca of South America? The Inca's figured out how to weave mountain grasses and other vegetation into cables, sometimes as thick as a person’s body, and then used them to build super-strong suspension bridges that spanned across gorges. Some of the structures spanned longer distances than anything European engineers of the time could construct with stone, though modern steel suspension bridges eventually achieved far greater scale. The last of the ancient Inca-style grass cable suspension bridges still spans a gorge in Peru’s Canas Province.

Interesting Fact:
Native American healers pioneered pain relief. In what is now Virginia, natives used jimson weed (scientific name Datura stramonium) as a topical analgesic, grinding the root to make a plaster that they applied to external injuries such as cuts and bruises, according to Keoke and Porterfield’s book.

Healers also had patients ingest the plant as an anesthetic as they set broken bones. Another native remedy for pain and inflammation was tea brewed from the bark of the American black willow (Salix nigra), which contains the chemical salicin. Once it gets into the body, salicin produces salicylic acid, the active ingredient in modern aspirin tablets. Native Americans also used capsaicin, a chemical found in hot peppers, for topical pain relief, according to De Gennaro.

Interesting Fact:
Mary G. Ross, Mathematician and Engineer, Cherokee (1908-2008) Mary Golda Ross is considered the first known Native American engineer and is the first female engineer to work for Lockheed. Her great grandfather John Ross was one of the longest serving chiefs of the Cherokee Nation. She received a Master’s degree in mathematics and was hired by Lockheed in 1942. The company sent her to study aeronautical engineering at UCLA. In her time, men dominated the corporate world; nevertheless, she worked her way up in Lockheed, most notably helping to develop plans for the P-38 Lightning Fighter plan and eventually went to work for NASA. Since NASA’s early spaceflight expertise relied on technology being used by the military and since Ross was an expert in this field of knowledge, she contributed greatly to their program. Although much of Ross’s work on testing top secret rocket and missile systems at NASA remains classified, it is known that she made important contributions to the Apollo Program and helped write NASA’s Planetary Flight Handbook, which is the agency’s guide to space travel.

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that in 1853 a Scottish doctor named Alexander Wood was credited for the creation of the first hypodermic syringe, but a much earlier tool existed. Before colonization, Indigenous peoples had created a method using a sharpened hollowed-out bird bone connected to an animal bladder that could hold and inject fluids into the body. These earliest syringes were used to do everything from inject medicine to irrigate wounds. There are also cases in which these tools were even used to clean ears and serve as enemas.

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that Minnesota is derived from Mnisota, which is the native name of the Minnesota River in the Dakota Sioux language. The name literally means, "cloudy water."

Interesting Fact:
It wasn’t until 1924 when all Native Americans were granted citizenship, after Congress enacted the Indian Citizenship Act.

Interesting Fact:
In World War I and World War II, Native Americans played a significant role as code talkers, leading to extremely successful communication operations. Navajo Native Verna Volker shared with Parade, “We’re very proud of our Navajo code talkers in World War II. They used the language to send these messages that, at the time, the Japanese couldn’t interpret. So they recruited these Navajo young men to make this code in the Navajo language—they always call it ‘the unbreakable code.’ And [the men] never got recognized when they got back for what they did—it was years later.” Their instrumental impact remained classified until 2002, when Congress acknowledged and celebrated the efforts of these brave soldiers, saying that at  “… a time when Indians were discouraged from practicing their native culture, a few brave men used their cultural heritage, their language, to help change the course of history.”

Interesting Fact:
The sport of hockey originated with the Saux, Foxes, and Assiniboine people, who were among the Native American tribes who played a game called “shinny,” where a ball was hit down a field (and in the winter, over ice) using a curved stick.

Interesting Fact:
Did you know that Popcorn dates back to 6,700 years ago and was discovered in Peru? American Indians first domesticated the strain of maize which produces popcorn thousands of years ago!