Like many children growing up in the space age, Jan Millsapps dreamed of being an astronaut. Her childhood was spent searching the night sky with the cheap and unstable telescope that she convinced her parents to buy it for, and watching the launch of Sputnik and the first astronauts to land on the moon in awe.
But Millsapps came of age when women were not encouraged or academically prepared for careers in science and technology. When she wrote to NASA asking how she could become an astronaut and received a standard letter that basically said it was not an option for women, it was clear to her that any dreams of space exploration would probably never come true.
Still, it was a moment that motivated her.
“I never would have called myself a feminist at the time, but that was instilled in me as I grew up. I realized that some careers or professional paths were open to me and others not just because of my gender, ”she says.
Now, the San Rafael writer and filmmaker’s mission is to share the hidden stories of women and their contributions to the space industry, as well as to defend diversity in space, through her multimedia work that took off after the 2018 launch of her documentary. 32-minute “Madame Mars”.
Since its debut at the United Nations in Vienna, it has been shown at DocLands, the documentary festival sponsored by the Marin’s California Film Institute, and has been selected as part of the 2020-21 American Film Showcase, an American cinema diplomacy program that organizes exhibitions and workshops with American filmmakers in more than 40 countries. Although the pandemic canceled the program’s travel plans, three online screenings of the film in Germany, along with panel discussions, will be shown later this month. The film can also be streamed on Amazon Prime as part of the Women in Science series at amazon.com/Women-in-Science/dp/B08R7NPS9G.
When she was interviewed at NPR for Women’s History Month in 2019, Millsapps was delighted that the interviewer called her a space feminist. “It was so exciting because I realized all my life that this is what I have been,” she says.
Millsapps, a founding member of the support and defense group Space4Women, guides and supports women interested in space and STEM fields through the Space4Women Network, an initiative of the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs.
Inspired in part by his novel “Venus on Mars”, his second space-themed book, and his research for him in Percival Lowell astronomer and assistant Wrexie Leonard, “Madame Mars” reshapes the history of space exploration as a feminist issue. It also shows how Mars’ current initiatives still lack a total commitment to diversity.
The documentary features women from the industry, such as Novato’s NASA astronaut, Yvonne Cagle, interacting with the audience at the Novato Space Festival; Donna Shirley, one of NASA’s first engineers who led efforts to land the first rover on Mars, and Kenya Armbrister, a candidate for the one-sided Mars One mission.
With each interview she conducted, Millsapps painted a picture of how little she had changed since her childhood.
“As humans prepare to go into space, we are still expected to present ourselves as this collective species, but this species is defined by the way the space industry, which is white, straight and male, was defined,” says Millsapps, who leads interviews with other women in the space industry through their Madame Mars newsletter. “We made some roads, but it is the same space culture that we had in the 1960s”.
And as a woman who experienced sexism in the workplace, it hit him.
“The women who currently worked for, say, large space agencies, did not want to be personal and intimate with me. In other words, they are not willing to say anything other than what the space agency wants them to say. I deduced that, ”says Millsapps, who has produced films, videos, digital and interactive cinema on topics ranging from domestic violence to global terrorism. “So they won’t say anything about sexism at NASA, for example. Their careers may depend on that. But what was interesting was when I talked to women from outside, they were more willing to talk about the problems. In a way, it reframed the whole problem that you might have a career somewhere, but you’re not free to say what you think. “
Path to film production
Millsapps’ transition to cinema came naturally. It all started with animation.
“I was very interested in some animators. I helped produce their programs, did interviews with them and communicated to the press for them. An animator, Robert Breer, was my first inspiration. He said, ‘All you need is tokens and markers,’ ”she says.
While working at a TV station, she started making animations at work using the station’s film and cameras on site, which soon began to gain strength and were shown at festivals.
“I was invited to go to the University of South Carolina to show an animation class and when I was there, the guy who was teaching animation said, ‘I’m leaving, do you want this job?’ So I moved to Columbia, South Carolina, taught there for seven for eight years, then got a job at San Francisco State and taught there for 37 years before I retired, ”she says.
As Millsapps continues with other projects, she wants to continue to tell several stories. “There are a lot more stories out there.”
next events
• The American Film Showcase, the United States Consulate General in Frankfurt and DAZ Stuttgart present an exhibition of “Madame Mars” at 10:30 am on March 23. A panel with Millsapps, German astrophysicist Suzanna Randall and moderator Anna Green will follow at 11.15 am I’m at Zoom. Register at daz.org/events/madame-mars.
• The Embassy of the United States of America in Germany and the Stiftung Planetarium Berlin present online exhibitions from March 20 to 30 at watch.eventive.org/americanfilmshowcase. A panel with Millsapps, Randall and Green follows at 10am on March 30th on YouTube at youtube.com/watch?v=DW5T8iFMeBM.