Sally Ride , the first American woman in space, and Mae Jemison , the first African-American woman in space, were both pioneers in their fields. Ride was a physicist and entrepreneur as well as an astronaut. She applied to NASA in 1977, the first year that women were allowed to apply to the space program, and was one of six women chosen for the 1978 astronaut corps. Nine years later, in 1987, Jemison — who has degrees in both engineering and medicine — was selected to join NASA. She later traveled to space on an eight-day, cooperative mission between the U.S. and Japan in 1992.
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