Elizebeth Smith Friedman (August 26, 1892 – October 31, 1980) was a cryptanalyst and author, and a pioneer in U.S. cryptography

Cryptography

Cryptography is the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of third parties...

. The special spelling of her name (more commonly spelled "Elizabeth") is attributed to her mother, who disliked the prospect of Elizebeth ever being called "Eliza." She has been dubbed "America's first female cryptanalyst".

Although she is often referred to as the wife of William F. Friedman

William F. Friedman

William Frederick Friedman was a US Army cryptographer who ran the research division of the Army's Signals Intelligence Service in the 1930s, and parts of its follow-on services into the 1950s...

, a notable cryptographer credited with numerous contributions to cryptology, she enjoyed many successes in her own right, and it was Elizebeth who first introduced her husband to the field.

Early life and education

Born in Huntington, Indiana

Huntington, Indiana

Huntington, known as the "Lime City", is a small city in and the county seat of Huntington County, Indiana, United States. It is in Huntington Township and Union Township...

 to John M. Smith, a Quaker

Religious Society of Friends

The Religious Society of Friends, or Friends Church, is a Christian movement which stresses the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Members are known as Friends, or popularly as Quakers. It is made of independent organisations, which have split from one another due to doctrinal differences...

 dairyman, banker, and politician, and Sopha Strock Smith, Mrs. Friedman was the youngest of nine children.

After briefly attending The College of Wooster

The College of Wooster

The College of Wooster is a private liberal arts college primarily known for its Independent study program. It has roughly 2,000 students and is located in Wooster, Wayne County, Ohio, United States . Founded in 1866 by the Presbyterian church as the University of Wooster, it was from its creation...

 in Ohio, she graduated from Hillsdale College

Hillsdale College

Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Michigan, United States, is a co-educational liberal arts college known for being the first American college to prohibit in its charter all discrimination based on race, religion, or sex; its refusal of government funding; and its monthly publication, Imprimis...

 in Michigan with a major in English literature. Having exhibited her interest in languages, she had also studied Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

, Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

, and German

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

, and minored "in a great many other things." Only she and one other sibling were privileged to attend college.

Riverbank Laboratories

The librarian who conducted the interview on her first day is credited with having made a phone call to Colonel George Fabyan

George Fabyan

George Fabyan was a millionaire businessman who founded a private research laboratory. Fabyan's laboratory pioneered modern cryptography, though its initial findings, supporting Fabyan's belief that Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare's plays, were later disproven by the cryptographers who trained...

 that would change the then Miss Smith's life forever.

The librarian conveyed in her telephone conversation Smith's love for Shakespeare, among other things. Colonel Fabyan, a wealthy textile merchant, soon met Miss Smith, and they discussed what life would be like at Riverbank

Fabyan Villa

Fabyan Villa was the home of George and Nelle Fabyan from c. 1908 to 1939. The house is notable because of its remodelling in 1907 by Frank Lloyd Wright. It was the centerpiece of the Fabyans country estate, which they named Riverbank...

, Fabyan's great estate located in Geneva, Illinois

Geneva, Illinois

Geneva is the county seat of Kane County, Illinois. It is located on the western fringe of the Chicago suburbs. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 26,652. Geneva is part of a tri-city area, along with St. Charles and Batavia...

. He told her that she would assist a Boston woman, Elizabeth Wells Gallup

Elizabeth Wells Gallup

Elizabeth Wells Gallup was an American educator and exponent of the Baconian theory of Shakespearian authorship....

 and her sister with Gallup's attempt to prove that Sir Francis Bacon had written Shakespeare's plays and sonnets by decrypting enciphered messages that were supposed to have been contained within the plays and poems.

At Riverbank Miss Smith joined a versatile and distinguished staff. There were typists, translators, a graduate student in genetics, and professionals specializing in acoustics, engineering. Riverbank was one of the first such facilities in the US to seriously study cryptography and other subjects. Through the work of the Friedmans, much historical information on secret writing was gathered. Until the World War I creation of MI8

MI8

MI8, or Military Intelligence, Section 8, was the cover designation for the Radio Security Service , a department of the British Directorate of Military Intelligence, part of the War Office...

, the Army's Cipher Bureau, Riverbank was the only facility in the US seriously capable of solving enciphered messages. Military cryptography had been officially deemphasized after the Civil War. During World War I, several US Government departments asked Riverbank Labs for help or sent personnel for training. Among those was Agnes Meyer Driscoll

Agnes Meyer Driscoll

Agnes Meyer Driscoll was, known as Miss Aggie or Madame X, an Americancryptanalyst during both World War I and World War II.-Early years:...

 who came on behalf of the Navy.

Among the staff of fifteen at Riverbank was the man Miss Smith would marry in May 1917: William F. Friedman

William F. Friedman

William Frederick Friedman was a US Army cryptographer who ran the research division of the Army's Signals Intelligence Service in the 1930s, and parts of its follow-on services into the 1950s...

. The newlyweds worked together for the next four years or so in the only significant cryptographic facility in the country, save Herbert Yardley

Herbert Yardley

Herbert Osborne Yardley was an American cryptologist best known for his book The American Black Chamber . The title of the book refers to the Cipher Bureau, the cryptographic organization of which Yardley was the founder and head...

's 'Black Chamber'. In 1921 Mr. and Mrs. Friedman left Riverbank to work for the War Department in Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

Government service

Mrs. Friedman's employment as a cryptanalyst for the U.S. Navy followed in 1923, which led to her subsequent positions with the U.S. Treasury Department's Bureaux of Prohibition and of Customs. Her career at both is quite significant and embraces cryptography against international smuggling and drug running in various parts of the world. The smugglers and runners resorted to encrypted radio messages to support their operations, presuming they would be able to communicate securely. This became a mistaken notion after Mrs. Friedman came to Washington.

While the Eighteenth Amendment

Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

The Eighteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution established Prohibition in the United States. The separate Volstead Act set down methods of enforcing the Eighteenth Amendment, and defined which "intoxicating liquors" were prohibited, and which were excluded from prohibition...

 of 1919 forbade the manufacture, sale, import, or export of intoxicating liquors, the Volstead Act

Volstead Act

The National Prohibition Act, known informally as the Volstead Act, was the enabling legislation for the Eighteenth Amendment which established prohibition in the United States...

 forbade the consumption of such beverages. Prevailing conditions during those days, however, encouraged illegal activity.

Further, as radio equipment became less cumbersome, less conspicuous, and more sophisticated, it afforded the criminal element another means to circumvent the law. To avoid taxes, etc., criminals smuggled liquor and, to a lesser degree, narcotics, perfume, jewels, and even pinto beans. Related enciphered communications were passed by persistent anti-prohibitionists to protect their operations.

Anti-prohibitionists provided Mrs. Friedman and her team of cryptanalysts with innumerable opportunities to hone their cryptanalytic/codebreaking skills during her employment with the U.S. Treasury Department. She led the cryptanalytic effort against international smuggling and drug-running radio and encoded messages, which the runners began to use extensively to conduct their operations. Even though early codes and ciphers were very basic, their subsequent increase in complexity and resistance to solution was important to the financial success and growth of their operations. The extent of sophistication seemed to pose little problem for Mrs. Friedman; she still mounted successful attacks against both simple substitution and transposition ciphers, and the more complex enciphered codes which eventually came into use. While working for the Coast Guard and the Bureau of Foreign Control during the Prohibition era, she solved over 12,000 rum-runners' messages.

Mrs. Friedman also perceived the need for a more dedicated effort against suspected communications. By 1931 she had convinced Congress of the need to create a headquartered, seven-man cryptanalytic section for this purpose. As her cryptanalytic responsibilities began to mount, Mrs. Friedman sensed the need to teach other analysts cryptanalytic fundamentals, including deciphering techniques. By relieving her of a part of the burden, this allowed her time to attack the more atypical new systems as they cropped up and expedited the entire process from initial analysis through to solution. It also allowed her to stay one step ahead of the smugglers.

In addition to her cryptanalytic successes, she was often called to testify in cases against accused parties. The messages she deciphered or decoded enabled her to implicate several smugglers operating in the Gulf of Mexico and on the Pacific Coast. She subsequently testified in cases in Galveston and Houston, Texas, and New Orleans, Louisiana. Her efforts in 1933 resulted in convictions against thirty-five bootlegging ringleaders who were found to have violated the Volstead Act. Ringleaders were directly linked with suspected vessels as a result of the information arising out of her analysis.

The next year she played a major role in settling a dispute between the Canadian and U.S. governments over the true ownership of the sailing vessel I'm Alone. It was flying the Canadian flag when it was sunk by a U.S. Coast Guard cutter for failing to heed a "heave to and be searched" signal. The Canadian government filed a $350,000 suit against the U.S., but the intelligence gleaned from the twenty-three messages decoded by Mrs. Friedman indicated de facto

De facto

De facto is a Latin expression that means "concerning fact." In law, it often means "in practice but not necessarily ordained by law" or "in practice or actuality, but not officially established." It is commonly used in contrast to de jure when referring to matters of law, governance, or...

U.S. ownership just as the U.S. had originally suspected. As a consequence, the true owners of the ship were identified and most of the Canadian claim was dismissed.

Obviously impressed with her work, the Canadian government sought Mrs. Friedman's help in 1937 with an opium dealer problem which evolved into an outstanding case. She complied and eventually testified in the trial of Gordon Lim and several other Chinese. Her solution to a complicated unknown Chinese enciphered code, in spite of her unfamiliarity with the language, was key to the successful convictions.

Finally, Mrs. Friedman left her mark on the life of one of espionage's most notorious spies, Velvalee Dickinson

Velvalee Dickinson

Velvalee Dickinson , was convicted of espionage against the United States on behalf of Japan during World War II. Known as the "Doll Woman", she used her business in New York City to send information on U.S. Naval forces to contacts in South America via steganographic messages...

, whose path to and role in espionage are noteworthy. Following high school and some college, Velvalee married the head of a brokerage firm that had Japanese-American clients. The Dickinson' interest in Japan grew so much that they joined the Japanese-American Society, where they began to rub shoulders with members of the Japanese consulate. When the brokerage firm's success suffered a downturn, so too did the Dickinson' role as proponents of good Japanese-American relations. At some point, the couple became spies for Japan. Velvalee became a major player, and her successful doll shop was a cover for her espionage. Known as the "Doll Woman," she corresponded with Japanese agents using the names of women she found in her business correspondence.

This would be her downfall. Her correspondence, which contained encoded material addressing significant naval vessel movement in Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor, known to Hawaiians as Puuloa, is a lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. Much of the harbor and surrounding lands is a United States Navy deep-water naval base. It is also the headquarters of the U.S. Pacific Fleet...

, was analyzed and solved by Mrs. Friedman. This analysis resulted in a guilty verdict against Mrs. Dickinson.

Although Mrs. Friedman worked closely with her husband as part of a team, many of her contributions to cryptology were unique. She deciphered many encoded messages throughout the Prohibition years and solved many notable cases singlehandedly, including some codes which were written in Mandarin Chinese.

During World War II Mrs Friedman's Coast Guard Unit was transferred to the Navy where they solved a difficult Enigma Code used by German Naval Intelligence.

During the post-World War II period, Mrs. Friedman became a consultant to and created communications security systems for the International Monetary Fund

International Monetary Fund

The International Monetary Fund is an organization of 187 countries, working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world...

.

Retirement

Longtime Shakespeare enthusiasts, Mrs. Friedman and her husband, after retirement from government service, collaborated on a manuscript entitled "The Cryptologist Looks At Shakespeare", eventually published as The Shakespearian ciphers examined. It won awards from the Folger Shakespeare Library

Folger Shakespeare Library

The Folger Shakespeare Library is an independent research library on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., in the United States. It has the world's largest collection of the printed works of William Shakespeare, and is a primary repository for rare materials from the early modern period...

 and the American Shakespeare Theater and Academy. In this book, the Friedmans dismissed Baconians

Baconian theory

The Baconian theory of Shakespearean authorship holds that Sir Francis Bacon, lawyer, philosopher, essayist and scientist, wrote the plays conventionally attributed to William Shakespeare, and that the historical Shakespeare was merely a front to shield the identity of Bacon, who could not take...

 such as Mrs. Gallup and Ignatius Donnelly

Ignatius Donnelly

Ignatius Loyola Donnelly was a U.S. Congressman, populist writer and amateur scientist, known primarily now for his theories concerning Atlantis, Catastrophism , and Shakespearean authorship, all of which modern historians consider to be pseudoscience and pseudohistory...

 with such technical proficiency and finesse that the book won far more acclaim than others addressing the same topic.

The work that Gallup had done earlier for Col Fabyan at Riverbank operated on two assumptions. One was that Bacon invented a biliteral cipher and that the cipher used in the original printed Shakespeare folios employed "an odd variety of typefaces." The Friedmans, however, "in a classic demonstration of their life's work," buried a hidden Baconian cipher on a page in their publication. It was an italicized phrase which, using the different type faces, expressed their final assessment of the controversy: "I did not write the plays. F. Bacon." Their book is regarded as the definitive work, if probably not the final word, on the subject.

Following her husband's death in 1969, Mrs. Friedman devoted much of retirement life to compiling a library and bibliography of his work. This "most extensive private collection of cryptographic material in the world" would finally be lodged in the George C. Marshall Research Library in Lexington, Virginia.

"Our office doesn't make 'em, we only break 'em," uttered Elizebeth Smith Friedman to a representative of a code-building company who came to sell his wares. And "break 'em" she did many times over for many years against many targets. Her successes led to the conviction of many violators of the Volstead Act during Prohibition years.

Mrs. Friedman died on October 31, 1980 in Plainfield, New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

, at the age of 88.