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Recently we had the pleasure to speak
with two space pioneers legends both on

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and off the screen.

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Nichelle Nichols and George Takei have
been outspoken advocates for greater

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diversity in exploration and have
leverage their fictional personas as

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Commander Nyota Uhura and Captain Hikaru Sulu in Star Trek to help our field grow

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and become stronger.

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Nichelle, starting with the space shuttle
program you helped NASA actively recruit

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astronauts of color for the first time
as one of the people to benefit from

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your work could you please tell us how
that came about and what you did.

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John Yardley requested my help because
NASA new how much our space program

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meant to me and how much I cared about
making our space program more inclusive.

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As an asian in a prominent role often
entrusted with huge responsibilities

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Sulu broke new ground

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did you see yourself as a role model?
Well at that time I was just happy to be

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doing Star Trek when I got cast I knew
that this was first of all personally

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fantastic opportunity to be playing a
character who was a part of the

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leadership team speaking without an
accent boldly going where no one had

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gone before you know but at the same
time it was I was mindful of the fact

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that as an Asian-American I was

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a representative figure.  Dr. King told me
that I could not leave I thought would

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you talking about  Dr. Martin Luther King but
what I really said was "why?". He said the

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show whether you like it or not you've
become a symbol. If you leave they can

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replace you and it will be like you were
never there,