The astronomer who shattered glass ceilings to get Hubble into orbit

When Nancy Grace Roman became NASA’s first chief of astronomy in 1961, the idea of placing a large telescope in Earth’s orbit seemed like science fiction. But Roman recognized the benefit of such a project— peering into space through Earth’s atmosphere, she said, is like “looking through a piece of old stained glass”—and until her retirement in 1979 she was the driving force in making the Hubble Space Telescope a reality. She coordinated the work of astronomers and engineers and secured $1.5 billion in funding for the observatory by telling Congress that every American, for the price of a single movie ticket, would enjoy years of scientific discoveries. Hubble finally launched in 1990 and was soon sending back dazzling photos of the cosmos. If astrophysicist Lyman Spitzer was the space telescope’s father, Hubble chief scientist Edward Weiler said in 1994, “then Nancy Roman was its mother.” Roman fell in love with stargazing while growing up “beneath the clear night skies of Reno, Nev.,” said NationalGeographic.com. At age 11, she started an astronomy club and was soon battling adults who tried to discourage her from pursuing a career in science. When Roman asked to take a second year of algebra in high school, a teacher told her it would be more ladylike to study Latin. After receiving a doctorate in astronomy, she joined the fledgling NASA in 1959, said The Washington Post, and soon became “one of the agency’s first female executives.” Roman oversaw the 1962 launch of a solar observatory to measure the sun’s electromagnetic radiation, and of numerous satellites that mapped Earth. “I am glad,” Roman said in 2016, “I ignored the many people who told me that I could not be an astronomer.”