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The Massachusetts Institute of Technology had its first African-American graduate, Robert R. Taylor, in 1892. It was only 25 years later, in 1917, that the university gave its first civil engineering diploma to an African-American. For quite a while throughout history, engineering was almost entirely the domain of white men.
Although Caucasian males still dominate the profession in the U.S. (only 5 percent of engineers are African-American, only 13.4 percent are women of any race, according to one 2011 report), it s important to recognize the significant legacies that Black men and women have created in the field [source: Koebler].
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In this article, we ll head from the copy machines at work to the satellites in space and meet some African-Americans who aren t just pioneers for their race but are trailblazers in their profession.