Agnes Meyer Driscoll

Agnes Meyer Driscoll was a pioneer in the code making and breaking sciences and work for DoD groups that would later become the National Security Agency. She was an educated technical leader.

Ms. Driscoll's work as a navy cryptanalyst who broke a multitude of Japanese naval systems, as well as a developer of early machine systems, marks her as one of the true "originals" in American cryptology. She was born in 1889, and in 1911 she received an A.B. degree from Ohio State University, majoring in mathematics, physics, foreign languages, and music. From her earliest days as a college student, Agnes Meyer pursued technical and scientific studies atypical for a woman of the times. After graduation, she moved to Amarillo, Texas, where she was director of music at a military academy, and, later, chair of the mathematics department at the local high school.

In June 1918, about one year after America entered World War I, Agnes Meyer enlisted in the United States Navy. She was recruited at the highest possible rank of Chief Yeoman and was assigned to the Code and Signal section of the Director of Naval Communications. Except for a two-year hiatus, when she worked for a private firm, Agnes Meyer Driscoll (she married in 1924) would remain a leading cryptanalyst for the U.S. Navy until 1949.