The excerpt best supports the inference that black women were key engineers during the dawn of the Space Age, contributing significantly despite facing discrimination and underestimation.
The best inference supported by the excerpt in Hidden Figures is that some of the key engineers at the dawn of the Space Age were black women. The excerpt points out the challenges and discrimination faced by women, particularly black women, in fields of work that were dominated by men. Despite contemporary negative stereotypes and underestimation of their abilities, women such as the Harvard Computers and those mentioned in Hidden Figures played a vital role in technological advances, including the space program. Their intellectual contributions were significant, even though they were often underpaid and undervalued compared to their male counterparts.