Mae Carol Jemison was born in Decatur, Alabama, on October 17, 1956, the youngest child of Charlie Jemison and Dorothy Green. Her father was a maintenance supervisor for a charity organization, and her mother worked most of her career as an elementary school teacher of English and math at the Beethoven School in Chicago. The family moved to Chicago, Illinois, when Jemison was three years old, to take advantage of the better educational and employment opportunities there. Jemison says that as a young girl growing up in Chicago she always assumed she would get into space.

In the spring of 1996, Jemison filed a complaint against a Texas police officer, accusing him of police brutality during a traffic stop that ended in her arrest. She was pulled over by Nassau Bay, Texas officer Henry Hughes for allegedly making an illegal U-turn and arrested after Hughes learned of an outstanding warrant on Jemison for a speeding ticket. In the process of arresting her, the officer twisted her wrist and forced her to the ground. In her complaint, Jemison said the officer physically and emotionally mistreated her. Jemison's attorney said she believed she'd already paid the speeding ticket years ago. She spent several hours in jail and was treated at an area hospital after release for deep bruises and a head injury. Jemison said in a televised interview that the incident has altered her feelings about police there. "I always felt safe and comfortable [around the police]. I don't feel that way anymore at Nassau Bay and that's a shame," she said. Jemison filed a lawsuit against the city of Nassau Bay and officer Hughes.  In 2007, diagnostic test provider Gen-Probe Inc. announced that they would not accept the resignation of Jemison from their board of directors. Jemison had failed to be re-elected to the board in a vote of the shareholders of the company at the company's May 31 annual stockholders meeting. The company said it believed that Jemison's failed re-election was the result of a recommendation by advisory firm Institutional Shareholder Services that shareholders vote against her due to her poor attendance at board meetings. Gen-Probe determined that Jemison's two absences in 2006 were for valid reasons and said Jemison had attended all regular and special board and committee meetings since September.  In 2017, a "Women of NASA" LEGO set went on sale featuring (among other things) mini-figurines of Jemison, Margaret Hamilton, Sally Ride, and Nancy Grace Roman.

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