Growing Innovating Researching and Learning STEM

Mommy Teaches Me Science presents STEM and A Movie, an educational outreach where students and parents participate together in a fun, hands-on STEM activity centered around the theme of a movie. Please join us on August 25, 2022 at 12pm in Pikesville. Register at Mommyteachesmescience.org

Tangible Hero Susan Taylor King

Our first Tangible Hero is Susan Emmaline Taylor King. She was born on July 13, 1924 in Upper Tidewater, Virginia in the town of Kilmarnock. She tells us her story below…

During the depression, my family was just barely able to survive on my father’s scant resources as a waterman in rural Virginia. Just prior to World War II, my family moved to Baltimore, Maryland so that my father could earn $5.00 a day working at the shipyard. My family of seven traveled 150 miles by car to Baltimore. All of the children entered schools in Baltimore. I entered Douglas High School and graduated in 1942.
Six months after graduation, World War II began. I graduated from high school in the academic curriculum; therefore, I had no skills for the world of work. My two friends and I entered riveting school because we had heard that there were a lot of jobs available. We attended riveting school on Washe Street in an old school building that no longer exists. Baltimore was a “top of the South or bottom of the North” city. There were separate signs on all of the stores downtown directing blacks to use one facility and whites to use another. Public schools were also segregated, so the riveting school was in a black neighborhood. Transportation, however, was not segregated. When we finished riveting school in 1942, we were hired immediately at Eastern Aircraft on Broening Highway in the Southeast section of Baltimore City. Work at Eastern Aircraft was completely integrated. All workers ate in the same cafeteria. There seemed to have been a social or civil relationship between the black and the white workers. I was a riveter who worked on the wings of aircraft. I assembled small parts that make up the wings and a supervisor would come by with a magnifying glass to make sure that all of the parts were assembled correctly.

She pioneered a way for black women to work in a majority white male field. Her story is our story! We must honor the women in STEM in our community while they are still here! Please send us your Tangible Heroes to [email protected].

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