A Visit to America’s National Cryptologic Museum

April 03, 2013

From VOA Learning English, this is EXPLORATIONS in Special English. I’m Jeri Watson.

And I’m Jim Tedder. Today we visit a small museum in the American state of Maryland. It is called the National Cryptologic Museum. There you will find information that was once secret.

The National Cryptologic Museum is on Fort George G. Meade, a military base near Washington, DC. It tells the story of cryptology and the men and women who have worked in this unusual profession.

The word cryptology comes from the Greek “kryptos logos.” It means “hidden word.” Cryptology is writing or communicating in ways designed to hide the meaning of your words.

The museum has many examples of equipment that was once used to make information secret. It also has equipment that was developed to read secret messages. The method of hiding exact meanings is called coding. People have used secret codes throughout history to protect important information.

The National Cryptologic Museum celebrated 60 years of cryptologic excellence in 2012. One event there marked the sixtieth anniversary of the National Security Agency. Two former NSA workers shared their memories of operating a code machine called Sigaba.

Many skills are needed to send and translate secret messages. The first and most important skill is knowing how to keep a secret. Helen Niebouar worked in Washington during World War Two and for the United States military in Japan after the war.