World War II Database

Contributor: C. Peter Chen

ww2dbaseAgnes May Meyer was born to Gustav Meyer in Illinois, United States in 1889. In 1895, her family moved to Westerville, Ohio, United States when Gustav Meyer became a music teacher at Otterbein College. Between 1907 and 1909, she attended Otterbein College before moving on to Ohio State University, where she would receive Bachelor of Arts degrees in mathematics and physics in 1911. Between 1911 and 1918, she resided in Amarillo, Texas, United States; during those years, she worked as the director of music at the Lowry Phillips Military Academy and the chair of the mathematics department at Amarillo High School. In Jun 1918, she enlisted in the US Naval Reserve and was given the rank of chief yeoman, the highest rank given to a new enlistee. During WW1, she worked the the US Nvay's Postal Cable Office, Censorship Office, and the Code and Signal section of the Director of Naval Communications. After the end of WW1, she remained with Code and Signal, though as a civilian. In 1920, she joined the Department of Ciphers at Riverbank Laboratories in Chicago, Illinois, on loan from the Office of the Director of Navel Communications. In 1921, after solving a puzzle published by the Hebern Electric Code Company, she was recruited to work for Hebern to create a new cipher machine; she would work for Hebern until the spring of 1924 when she returned to the Office of the Director of Naval Communications. In Aug 1924, she married attorney Michael Driscoll and took his surname. In 1926, after 3 years of work, she cracked the Japanese Navy "Red" cipher. In early 1935, she led the successful effort to crack the M-1 "Orange" cipher machine. In 1940, she made some discoveries that would later become instrumental in cracking the JN-25 code. In 1942, she headed a team working on the German Enigma code. In 1943, she was a member of the team working on the Japanese "Coral" code. In 1945, she worked on Soviet codes. In 1949, she was transferred to the newly formed Armed Forces Security Agency, thus officially ending her US Navy career; in 1952, the agency would be renamed the National Security Agency. She retired from the National Security Agency in 1959. She passed away in 1971 and was buried at the Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia, United States. In 2000, Driscoll was inducted into the National Security Agency's Hall of Honor.

Agnes Meyer Driscoll Timeline