Nichelle Nichols

Personal context

Summary

Nichelle Nichols was an American actor and singer best known for playing Lieutenant Uhura on Star Trek, a role that placed a black woman in a position of authority on television. She later appeared in the series and films including Heroes and Snow Dogs. Nichols publicly described Uhura as a groundbreaking, non-stereotypical role and said Martin Luther King Jr. persuaded her to remain on the show because of its importance to black viewers. She also campaigned for NASA to recruit women and racial minorities as astronauts, and served as a public advocate for their participation in space exploration; no public partisan campaign or LGBTQ advocacy is on record.