Women of NASA (Lego Ideas 21312)
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Women of NASA (Lego Ideas 21312).jpg) (i)
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in storage 2017 |
2017 box art [image info]
The "Women of NASA" set (Lego Ideas 21312) was a small Lego set designed to commemorate women who'd contributed significantly to NASA, and to inspire children (and remind adults) to think of mathematics and engineering, and piloting a Space Shuttle, as being things that women were provably perfectly capable of doing.
The set builds into three black plinths, featuring four female mini-figures.
- Margaret Hamilton - Computer scientist responsible (as team leader) for the flight software installed on the command module and Lunar Lander - all the things that the astronauts actually used once the Saturn V's automated rockets had gotten them into space. Hamilton was the subject of a famous photograph showing her standing next to a huge stack of Apollo printouts that was the same height as her, and the Lego plinth reproduced that scene. Hamilton invented the term "software engineering".
- Nancy Grace Roman - NASA's first "Chief of Astronomy", Roman planned and oversaw a range of satellite projects, most notably the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) launched in 1990. Roman's minifigure is shown alongside a model of the HST.
- Sally Ride and Mae Jemison, two of the Shuttle astronauts, on a plinth, flanking a mini-model of the space shuttle and boosters, ready for launch.
Overall, it's nice little set, the construction leaflet contains a brief biography page on each person, and even for those who have no interest at all in social history, it includes very cute little models of the Hubble Space Telescope and the ready-to-launch Space Shuttle complete with external tank and solid rocket boosters.
Katherine Johnson
Katherine Johnson (1918-2020), the NASA mathematician who played a major part in the calculations for the Apollo missions and later missions, and who was later made famous by the film "Hidden figures" (2016) was originally also intended to be included in the set, but declined when asked. Johnson was, however, the subject of a special "Katherine Johnson" Barbie doll.
Background
Issued in 2017, the WON set was seen by many as a response and partial apology for the launch of the LEGO Friends range in 2012.
Lego had been coming in for some criticism that their models were overly aimed at boys, and, realising that 90% of the sets bought for children were being bought for boys, had decided to commission a new range aimed at girls. The result was a range of female figures with skinny arms and pastelly jade, pink, and purple buildings showing aspirational lifestyles such as veterinarian and pop star, based on the observation that lots of little girls seemed to like playing with flowers and ponies.
Although the range was a commercial success, Lego's potentially well-meaning initiative promptly backfired from the point of view of public relations, with outraged commentators arguing that producing a separate "girl's Lego" that played up to gender stereotypes was perpetuating those stereotypes. Lego had always done quite well out of their reputation for being "progressive", so rather than pandering to the stereotypes, why not try to provide parents with the tools that would help them to educate their children to realise that the world allowed other career and lifestyle possibilities? Rather than assume that Lego pirate sets were necessarily for boys, why not have a policy that each set ought to include both male and female characters? Why not include female pirates, and female police, and female commercial airplane pilots, and female astronauts?
Who said that engineering ought to be considered to be a "boys" subject?
When the company then produced the "Women of NASA" set, they were generally reckoned to have hit the brief perfectly, with many vehement critics of Friends subsiding from their earlier anti-company stance, and taking the position, "Apology accepted".
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