Here is a booklet on the WAVES that came to Dayton in WWII. It tells of their activities, but not their purpose for being here. I have included a rather lengthy tale here of how they helped save thousands of lives. The Bombe: Keeping the Secret - by Curt Dalton It began in 1918 when an eleven-year-old boy by the name of Joseph Desch first saw a crystal radio set in a store. He later recalled that “right then and there I knew what I wanted to do with my life.” Joseph’s daughter, Deborah Anderson, says her father passed his first amateur radio license exam in 1926 and spoke fondly of evenings when he would repair radios for fellow students at the University of Dayton. “Not only had he gained the skill necessary for building and repairing radios, but long before his graduation in 1929, with a degree in Electrical Engineering, he had begun experimenting at home, using various gasses and metal filaments in vacuum tubes blown in his basement laboratory.” says Debbie. After working for General Motors Radio and Frigidaire, Joseph was hired in 1938 to work for the National Cash Register Company in Dayton, to begin the Electrical Research Laboratory. “The move to NCR changed my father’s life, allowing him to capitalize on his love of electronics and research.” He began to experiment on ways to develop an electronic counter. A contract was signed with M.I.T. Labs to develop a ‘Rapid Arithmetical Selector’. “In addition, in the summer of 1940 the National Defense Research Committee had requested that the NCR Laboratory develop electronic defense equipment,” says Debbie. “The objective was a counter, operable at one million counts per second. In short, he and Robert Mumma, who had joined him at NCR, were quickly establishing the Electrical Research Laboratory as a pioneer in electrical computation.” In 1941 their research drew the attention of the Navy as it searched for a company to accept Defense contracts. “Their initial contract grew into the Naval Computing Machine Laboratory, which opened at NCR on March 9, 1942. The facility, under the command of Captain Ralph Meader, with Joseph Desch as Research Director, was housed in Building 26 on Stewart Street.” Pressure was put on Joseph and his engineers to develop a code-breaking machine. The German military was using a machine, called the Enigma, to encode secret messages. British cryptanalysts, using a machine called a ‘Bombe’ had been successful in decoding these messages at the beginning of WWII. However in February of 1942 a fourth rotor was added to the Naval Enigma, thereby rendering the British bombe almost useless. The readings of these coded messages were very important to the war effort. In 1942 German Submarine U-boats sank more that 1,660 ships in the Atlantic. It was estimated that one in five Allied seamens deaths were caused by U-boats. Fortunately, the U-boats would communicate with a base on shore to plan their attacks. Desch worked with British scientists to develop the first U.S. code-breaking computer. Six times faster than its British counterpart, it enabled the Navy to decode the radio communications sent and received by the U-boats. This information was useful in helping the Allies both avoid and destroy U-boats. Plans were made and in April 1943, women from the WAVES began arriving in Dayton to help build the bombes as quickly as possible. The Waves were escorted to their new home, called Sugar Camp. John H. Patterson, the original owner of National Cash Register, or NCR, had first opened the camp in 1894 for the purpose of training his companys salesmen. Tents were raised in the spring and summer on land located near the west end of Schantz Road, just south of the NCR factory complex. The land was thickly wooded with large maple trees, where at one time syrup was made. In the 1920s Patterson built 60 cabins to accommodate his sales force. It was in these cabins that the WAVES stayed. I remember how strange and new everything seemed when we arrived in Dayton and how unique Sugar Camp was,” says ex-WAVE Jimmie Lee Long. Living in a cabin surrounded by those huge trees was quite a change from the boot school in the Bronx. One half of a cabin was separated from the other by a shower. Each side slept either two or three women. Sugar Camp’s thirty-one acres also contained a dining hall, recreation building, social center, baseball diamond and a large outdoor swimming pool. We were delighted with Sugar Camp,” says Sue Eskey. It felt like a little country club. We were more or less like a bunch of overgrown Girl Scouts. We loved it. The WAVES were given their room assignments, then taken to Building 26 at NCR. It was here that the WAVES began assembling parts for the bombes. At Building 26 we learned how to solder and how to lace harnesses, terminal boards, all sorts of electronic operations that we had never done before,” says Evelyn Hodges Vogel. We were quite adept after a while. The building consisted of a number of rooms. A male Marine guarded each room. We would go down the hill to the NCR building that had been turned over to us. says Ronnie Mackey Hulick. “We had to show identification to get into the building. We sat at a big table and they would bring us a graft and a rotor wheel. The wheels were known as commutators. Each commutator had two sets of twenty-six wires. Each wire was a different length and a different color. This was before plastic so these wheels were Bakelite. Theyd give us a soldering iron and we would follow a graft, and put these little wires according to the graft. And that would be what wed do during an eight-hour shift. Youd sit there with a soldering iron and wire those little wheels according to a graft. And when youd finish one they promptly brought you another one. Secrecy was constantly stressed. A WAVE would never see any other part of Building 26, nor meet any of the personnel, except at Sugar Camp. Our work, of course, was strictly secret,” says Evelyn Vogel. Wed never talk about the actual work to each other outside of that room that we were locked in. Nobody had admittance to any of these individual rooms unless they had a reason for being there, and could prove it to the Marine on guard. Most of the women didnt know what they were building, and none of them dared to ask. You didnt question what you were doing. says Jimmie Lee Long. You just kept that old soldering iron going. At the time Sue Eskey had an idea of what the rotors’ function might be. If you had any intuition or deep thoughts about it you could sort of figure it out. Theres 26 wires and 26 digits on the wheels and, oh yeah, the alphabet has 26 digits, too. So you sort of put two and two together. I knew absolutely nothing about codes or anything, but I had that thought. And, of course, I didnt share it with anyone because we were not allowed to talk about anything. A routine was soon established. The WAVES would march from Sugar Camp, down Schantz Road, then down Main Street (Route 48) to Building 26. We marched in the street,” says Sue Eskey. We did this because the sidewalk wasnt broad enough. When we marched it was four abreast. We worked in three shifts around the clock,” says Mary Lavettre. These shifts were from midnight to 8 a.m., 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and 4 p.m. to midnight. This was a new experience for many of us, as was having a meal at 0230 or 0300 (2:30 a.m. or 3 a.m.). Dorothy Firor was the Officer-In-Charge of one of the rooms in Building 26. I would stand at the door and say good morning as the girls came in. One of them would always say Whats good about it? Evelyn Vogel was one of the women in Dorothy’s room. The loveliest thing was that when we would have lunch hour or rest period, we would all put our heads down on our work table and Miss Firor would read to us the Bobsey Twins or Little Women. She would read us all these childhood books, and just lull us into relaxation. Then when the time period was up she would close the book and say Well, Ill start on the rest of it later. We were her flock. Sue Eskeys only complaint was that the work seemed boring at times, especially on the graveyard shift. Bonnie Skinner would sing to us half the night so we could stay awake. She had a beautiful operatic voice. “The work at NCR was tiring,” agrees Jimmie Lee Long, “and there was no room for the slightest mistake. Now I understand why. I feel we did do high quality work at a time when all of America was under great pressure.” People were always puzzled as to what the Navy was doing in Dayton. We told them the old song and dance about taking courses we needed for something. It was accepted, since no one, now or then, can figure out what the government is up to. says Elaine MacIntyre. Our rank was Specialist Q.,” says Mary Kelly Seale. It meant communications, but we told people it meant Cutie Pies. Charlotte Edwards of the Dayton Daily News interviewed Sue Eskey in 1943. Entitled ‘A Day with the WAVES stationed in Dayton’; the two-page article told “the story of one day, filled with activity and fun and the feeling of doing the work which must be done to win the war.” The article told of how Susie started her day off by making her bed, taking a shower, and dressing for the day in a white blouse, navy skirt and a well-pressed jacket. Breakfast comes next, in the NCR cafeteria. At 7:20 a.m. the muster bell rings and Susie marches off to work with the rest of the WAVES that are scheduled to work the 8 to 4 shift. (The Dayton Daily News makes no mention as to what this work might entail.) Home from work Susie changes into sports clothes to relax and play some ping pong, swim in the pool, or lie around and read her mail. Later comes dinner, then the lowering of the flag at 7 p.m. For those WAVES not working the third shift, the rest of the evening is their own to do as they please. There were a lot of things for a young lady to do when she wasnt in Building 26. After our watch was over, wed go wherever we wanted. says Sue Eskey. If we had rides we could ride home or we walked home. It took a little while to educate the people that when we were marching in formation we couldnt accept rides. Very often wed be marching along and cars would drive up and say I can take four, I can take five of you. They were always wanting to give us rides. We really appreciated it. We had no other ways to travel other than the bus. Colonel Edward Deeds (chairman of NCR) seemed very sympatico with the WAVES at that time. He would often be there with his car to pick up girls on rainy days and send out a chauffeur with a car to pick up a carload of girls and transport us up the hill to Sugar Camp. The women were very grateful to be treated so well in Dayton. “People in general were just very, very nice to us, says Sue Eskey. I think we were sort of an oddity to them, you know, to have a bunch of Navy women in Dayton, Ohio. Wanda Wahlman Ford was in high school in Dayton at the time. Her mother and father, Hazel and Arthur Wahlman, would sometimes have the WAVES out to their home. It was war time and in that time people were different. They cared about others. Dad would go down to the USO and ask if there were any service people there that couldnt make it home for the holidays. And he would bring two or three or four out to the house for Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner. My mother was a great cook, a big table and we had company all the time. Only they werent company, they really turned out to be family. We did lots of things together. A couple we even took to our own family reunions. We just sort of adopted them. You tried to do everything you could to help anybody in the service. They were giving their time to the country. They were really great people. We kept in touch over the years with quite a few. Even the people in the department stores were lovely to us. says Dorothy Braswell. One store kept nylons for us when he would get a shipment in. It was hard to find nylons in those days. There were a lot of ways for the WAVES to entertain themselves at Sugar Camp. Wed play ball games. says Evelyn Einfeldt. The WAVES played against the civilian girls and the sailors against the civilian guys. And NCR would have a picnic down on the river. They had talent night one time and Einfeldt was picked to sing with three other WAVES. You know, it was just crazy talent. My grandson wont even let me sing his birthday song. The local theaters were a great source of entertainment. Frances Whitener recalls a particularly memorable evening. Once when a group of us went to see Bing Crosby in Dixie the theme was played at the beginning of the movie. Being a good Southerner, I stood up. All of a sudden, I felt someone tugging at my skirt. I looked down and (Margaret) Sherry whispered, Why are you standing up? I answered, We always stand up at home when Dixie is played. I looked around and nobody else was standing. The girls had a big laugh at my expense, which didnt please me at all. That night I was awakened by Sherrys voice from the next cabin singing Dixie. I got out of bed, turned on all the lights so she could see me, and stood at attention until she stopped singing. There were dances every night at the USOs. There was the Van Cleve and the Biltmore. remembers Iris Bryant Castle. There was a special room in each hotel. The Biltmores dance floor was located in the Kittyhawk Room. We went to Lantzs Merry-Go-Round Night Club for dancing and movies. says Evelyn Burbacher. I dont think we ate in many restaurants, but one place was called the Purple Cow. Near NCR was a restaurant called Averys. says Sue Eskey. I still have a table mat from there with the following note- Best hamburgers in Dayton. Dorothy Braswell remembers the time she met someone quite famous. After I was in Dayton about a year, I believe, I was at some celebration up at the Carillon and I had the very special honor to meet Orville Wright. I was so thrilled to shake his hand and tell him I was from North Carolina. He was such a sweet and shy little man and I didnt wash my hand for weeks. There was also time for romance. At least 24 WAVES were married while stationed in Dayton, half of them within the first five months. Oh, we did have our romances. says Peggy Cox Whittaker. I met Doug in Dayton He was a pilot at Wright Field. He came to a party as Sugar Camp once because he had seen me at the Biltmore and wanted to meet me, but I had a date. After dating for approximately six months, Peggy Cox married Doug Whittaker on July 14, 1945. We leased a house from another couple. When I would stay there, and Doug was gone, I was afraid to stay alone. A dog would get in the garbage can, or something, and it would scare me and so Id just get in the car and go out to the WAVE camp. Thered always be an extra bunk and Id sleep there until Doug came home. Vivian Kurtz met Paul Kintner while in Dayton. I was Signal Corps, stationed at Wright says Paul. We met at a YWCA dance in Dayton. It was a cold winter and I was an officer so I couldnt take her to the Officers Club. And I couldnt go to the Enlisted Club. That was forbidden. So we courted outside. They met anywhere they could keep warm. One time we got kicked out of a hotel lobby.” remembers Vivian. “We were staying too long. The cold became too much so they were married at a church near his parent’s home in Indiana in January, 1944. Eventually, the bombes were ready to be used. One morning I came to work and there, on the railroad track beside our building, were these huge things on these flatcars. Ronnie Hulick remembers. But I couldnt tell what it was because it was covered with a gray shroud. And when I went on duty, thats when I was told we were going back to Washington, D. C. It was there that the WAVES were taught how to run the bombes, or the Grey Elephants, as they were sometimes called. They would be given a chart that told them how to set the switches and rotors on the bombe. Wed set 36 switches, and then wed put on these rotor wheels and set them. says Ronnie Hulick. When all 36 switches were set and the 36 wheels were set, then wed push a button. Then we would sit there and wait until we had what we called a strike. When they would get a strike the machine would print out a piece of paper. The paper would be taken down the hall and handed to a decoder. Cryptoanalysts would use the information to decipher intercepted messages. The Cryptoanalysts ran the code through a replicated Enigma machine, transfer the German or Japanese text to English, and pass the message on to Naval Intelligence. Although dull work, the efficiency of the machines relied on the accuracy on the person who set the dials, so only highly efficient women were chosen to run the bombes. It wasn’t until years later that most of the women would come to realize just exactly how important their work was. A few months after they were discharged the Navy sent each of the WAVES involved in the bombe project a ribbon signifying that they had been part of a unit that had received a commendation. They sent us this citation and they said Because of the nature of your work, youll get no publicity of this. says Sue Eskey. Well, they had us so brainwashed, we knew durn well that what it meant was that you just put it away and shut up! You dont say anything about it. That was it. Thank you. I never wore it. I just put it away. We had two ribbons when we got out. It was an American Campaign ribbon and a Victory ribbon. So I pop up with a number three ribbon that doesnt join the other ones. And my mother says What is this babe? Whats this for? And I said I guess they gave them to all the WAVES because they were women. You had to tell those little white lies. In 1972 Britain declassified many of its World War II documents, including the Ultra operation. In 1984 the United States declassified some of its documents on the Magic operation. Books began to appear on the subject, but little mention was made of the Waves large involvement in the bombe project. Sue Eskey was in Washington D.C. on the American Heritage Trail in April 1993 when she received the shock of her life. At the Museum of American History I found this display with this huge big coding machine that we had worked on. I felt guilty. I thought My God, whats it doing out here? Everyone is coming by and looking at it! Im looking at this (machine) and surrounding it is a floor to ceiling black and white photo mural of this huge room that we worked in. There were these banks of machines all the way down and over to the center, with work tables down the center. I looked over to the side and there I am sitting at the table, just as big as life. Well, I almost fainted. I couldnt believe it. Ginny Smith lives in Philadelphia, so as soon as I got back to the motel I called her and told her. I said Youll never believe what I saw today. And she said What? And I said I saw the big monsters that we used to work. I never dared to even use the name of the machine yet, you know, because even though it was public I was still a little rattled. She said Youre kidding. She knew immediately what I was talking about. So we decided that wed have to get a reunion up among just a few of us that were friends that we knew. So four of us got together in September, and went back to see the Shrine. The Shrine of Suzie. I tell you. Joseph Desch died in 1987, never having revealed to his daughter his work during the war. After finding out about the code-breaking project her father was involved in, she wrote an article called “Joseph Desch and Magic”. This was published in a Montgomery County Historical Society journal in 1993. “Joseph Desch’s contributions did not go unrecognized.” wrote Debbie Anderson “An indication of these extraordinary events hung on a wall of Dad’s study. The citation from Harry S. Truman, accompanying the Medal for Merit awarded my father in 1947, was a familiar fixture whose significance I have only recently appreciated. Once a family friend read the citation aloud until Dad, red faced from embarrassment and concerned about questions he could not answer, stopped him.” President Harry S. Truman’s citation praised Desch’s work, without actually mentioning what it was. “By his brilliant originality, superb skill and immeasurable perseverance, he contributed essentially to the effectiveness of important technical developments of great significance in the successful conclusion of the war. Mr. Desch’s technical skill and fine professional judgment reflect the highest credit upon him, and upon the scientific tradition of the United States.” By order of President Truman, awards of the Medal of Merit were to be given “to such civilians of nations prosecuting the war...as having distinguished themselves by exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding services in the furtherance of the prosecution of the war...” The Medal of Merit Award was approved for just 367 individuals. Debbie wanted to organize a reunion of the WAVES, Navy machinists and engineers who had worked with her father on the Bombe project so that Dayton would realize the important part it had played in during World War II. Unfortunately, the one woman she had known who worked as a Dayton WAVE had passed away and she couldn’t locate any others. But a year later Dayton Daily News published an article by James Cummings called “WAVES of Silence” about the Dayton WAVES. Before long the Dayton WAVES began contacting Anderson about a reunion. With the help of the U. S. Air Force Museum and Carillon Historical Park, who acted as co-sponsors for the reunion, Deborah Anderson organized the 50th reunion of the U. S. Naval Computing Machine Laboratory who had been stationed at NCR during World War II. AT&T Global Information Solutions and the Dayton Chapter of the Institute of Electrical & Electronic Engineers also participated. The Dayton Chapter IEEE underwrote the reunion with a generous grant. In September 1995 the men and women that had worked on the bombe were once again assembled in Dayton. Each Wave was awarded an Exceptional Service Award from the National Security Agency by Phil Bochicchio for exceptional service on Project Ultra in the breaking of German and Japanese codes during World War II. This is the highest award given to civilians. Robert Mumma was given the award as well, as was Debbie Anderson, in her fathers name. On April 5, 1945, at an annual meeting of the Twenty-Five Year Club of NCR, Colonel Edward Deeds spoke of the work being done by the WAVES and NCR for the war effort. “And in Building 26 for almost three years we have been engaged on a secret Navy project, the full story of which we hope can some day be told. Whenever our country called, we responded willingly. Whenever necessary, we literally tore the factory apart to get under way without delay. Everybody in this room and the thousands of NCR employees who are not here, will always be able to point with pride to what they and their company did to help win the war.” According to Navy records, the WAVES released 50,500 men to sea duty and filled 27,000 other jobs. The building of the Bombe is possibly the most significant war time secret that was never compromised. No one knew until the declassification of the records that this project existed. Their success in keeping the secret is something that the WAVES involved with the Bombe project are very proud of. The world will never forget these ladies, or their work. Because of their efforts it has been estimated that World War II was shortened by one, possibly two, years. In 1945 General Dwight D. Eisenhower, in a letter to the British military, wrote that information obtained from intercepted German messages “saved thousands of British and American lives and, in no small way, contributed to the speed with which the enemy was routed and eventually forced to surrender.”
Posted on: Mon, 27 Oct 2014 23:02:51 +0000
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