The Women

THE WOMEN: Breaking Barriers

The women of World War II are often described as cogs in a machine completing the necessary but not revolutionary tedious work. Yet, many individual women spearheaded high-level breakthroughs in codebreaking, providing the U.S. with critical intel and simultaneously transcending societal barriers due to their gender.

Highlight: Elizebeth Friedman

Elizebeth and William Freidman were a codebreaking duo, yet while her husband was considered a “legend,” Elizebeth’s work was forgotten.


During World War II, Elizebeth discovered a network of Nazi spies colluding to support fascist revolutions in South America and ultimately target the United States. Elizebeth’s commitment to secrecy allowed for J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI to unfairly take credit for this accomplishment, ensuring that the boundaries she had broken stayed hidden for decades. ​​​

Interview with Professor Holmes regarding the nature of Ms. Friedman's work. [2]

Elizebeth Friedman [1]

A book written in the 1970s praising William Friedman for his work while credit for Elizebeth largely went forgotten. [3]

Multiple other women in big or small ways, many inspired by the very first like Elizabeth Friedman, broke boundaries that allowed the United States to match and even advance the technological progress of the Axis powers [see Code Breaking page]. The women provided an essential information that enabled the sinking of enemy supply ships and the invasion of Normandy. Their barrier breaking, though hidden at the time, proved at least to the government that for the nation to progress, women must too. 

"Genevieve Grotjan, who broke the challenging “Purple” Japanese code with the US Army Signals Intelligence " [4]

Anna Caracristi (center) broke boundaries in both her daily code-breaking of Japanese messages and her ability to rise in positions, eventually becoming the first female deputy of the NSA. [5]   

Named one of the true “originals” of American code-breaking, Agnes Driscoll served at the highest ranking of the Code and Signal sector of the Director of Naval communications, chief yeoman. ​​​​[6]

Virginia Aderholt broke the code that ended World War 2, breaking the barriers of peace and simulatenously demonstrating the value of women to national security. [7]


"In the navy she was without peer as a cryptanalyst. Some of her pupils, like Ham Wright, were more able mathematicians but she had taught cryptanalysis to all of them, and none ever questioned her superb talent and determination in breaking codes and ciphers... Among her uniformed naval colleagues, she was held in the highest esteem throughout her long career, which continued from the Office of Naval Communications to the Armed Forces Security Agency, and then to the National Security Agency, before she retired in 1959."
~ Edwin T. Layton on Agnes Driscoll's Talent[ 8]

BACK: Code Breaking 

NEXT: Pushback Against Women

Footnotes: 

  1. BBC, BBC, last modified October 9, 2017, accessed January 25, 2020, https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20171009-the-female-code-breakers-who-were-left-out-of-history-books.
  2. Susan Holmes, interview by the author, Palo Alto, CA, January 21, 2020.
  3. Lambros D. Callimahos, The Legendary William F. Friedman (Cryptologic Spectrum, 1974), 1: , accessed January 25, 2020, https://www.nsa.gov/Portals/70/documents/news-features/declassified-documents/cryptologic-spectrum/legendary_william_friedman.pdf.
  4. Genevieve Grotjan, who broke the challenging "Purple" Japanese code with the US Army Signals Intelligence Service, photograph, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, accessed March 2, 2020, https://airandspace.si.edu/multimedia-gallery/genevieve-grotjanjpg.
  5. Decoding Japanese shipping codes was nearly impossible, but they were cracked by specially recruited women schoolteachers, photograph, accessed January 25, 2020, https://www.jasonfagone.com/woman-who-smashed.
  6. Agnes Meyer Driscoll, photograph, National Security Agency, accessed February 9, 2020, https://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic-heritage/historical-figures-publications/women/Article/1623020/agnes-meyer-driscoll/.
  7. Kelly McSweeney, "WWII Codebreakers Secretly Hacked Military Messages," Now, last modified May 20, 2019, accessed April 4, 2020, https://now.northropgrumman.com/wwii-codebreakers-secretly-hacked-military-messages.
  8. Edwin T. Layton, And I was There (Naval Institute Press, 2006), 58, accessed February 9, 2020, https://books.google.com/books/about/And_I_was_There.html?id=bZkmLX8i6UgC.