Why is NASA’s flagship spy satellite christened ‘Nancy Grace Roman?’
In 1961, Nancy Grace Roman was already the first Chief of Astronomy in the 'Office of Space Science,' at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
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NASA launching its latest flagship space observatory Roman and viewers can watch the coverage live online from the comfort of their homes.
NASA and SpaceX are targeting the launch of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope on August 30 at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
The infrared telescope’s ride, a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, will lift off from the historic Launch Complex 39A pad, the same that sent Apollo 11 and the maiden voyage of the Space Shuttle into orbit.
But why is the Satellite called Nancy Grace Roman?
The ‘Mother of Hubble?’
By Margaret A. Weitekamp – National Air and Space Museum
Why Is Nancy Grace Roman Called The “Mother of Hubble?”
Well, in 1961, Nancy Grace Roman was already the first Chief of Astronomy in the ‘Office of Space Science,’ at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
She developed that program in a time before the second wave of the Women’s Movement in the United States started.
It was at the time when banks often refused women credit in their own names, and there was still an active medical debate about whether women could ever physically endure spaceflight someday.
But Roman opened the skies to humanity in new ways without ever leaving the ground.
Roman’s Path to NASA
Nancy Roman earned her Ph.D. in astronomy at the University of Chicago in 1949 and worked at the Yerkes Observatory there for six years afterward.
She joined the radio astronomy group at the Naval Research Laboratory, becoming the head of the microwave spectroscopy section.
When she heard that NASA might set up a space astronomy program, she wanted to lead it.
“The idea of coming in with an absolutely clean slate to set up a program that I thought was likely to influence astronomy for 50 years was just a challenge that I couldn’t turn down.
That’s all there is to it,” she recalled in 1980 in an oral history interview with National Air and Space Museum curator David DeVorkin.
She joined NASA in 1959, just after the agency’s founding.
Not a Hidden Figure, But a Recognized Leader at NASA
Hubble Space Telescope in Space Race
Roman was not a “hidden figure,” but rather a recognized leader in her field.
As the founding chief of astronomy and solar physics, she was the first woman to hold an executive position at NASA.
Nancy became best known as the “Mother of the Hubble Space Telescope.” She began working on the question of putting astronomical instruments into space as early as 1962.
She puzzled about how an accurate pointing system could be incorporated on a telescope or detector that would be small enough to be launched by the rockets of the day.
Her advocacy for putting the tools of astronomy in space, beyond the blurring effects of the Earth’s atmosphere, eventually led to the Hubble Space Telescope.
Roman’s Enduring Legacy
She was a longtime friend of the Museum and a welcome contributor to the scholarly communities working on space history and space science. Even in her 80s and 90s, she frequently participated in scholarly meetings in the Washington, DC metro area.
The original prototypes of the LEGO® Ideas “Women of NASA” set displayed in front of the Apollo Lunar Module in the Boeing Milestones of Flight Hall.
The original prototypes of the LEGO® Ideas “Women of NASA” set displayed in front of the Apollo Lunar Module in the Boeing Milestones of Flight Hall at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.
In a coda that underscores her significance, Roman was one of the inspiring women whom MIT writer Maia Weinstock chose to depict in her “Women of NASA” LEGO kit (produced for sale by the company beginning in 2017).
The white-haired plastic figurine stands next to a tiny Hubble Space Telescope, as a tribute to a career of leadership in space astronomy.
In her honor, NASA has also named a space telescope the “Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.”
Due to launch by May 2027, NASA explains the telescope “will have a field of view at least 100 times larger than Hubble’s, potentially measuring light from a billion galaxies in its lifetime.”
It will join Hubble and the James Webb Space Telescope helping us picture our universe.
Images taken by the space telescopes stand not only as scientific contributions but as breathtaking visions of the beauty of our universe. The next time you see one, thank Nancy Grace Roman.
