My Lecture About Bletchley Park at the New York Military Affairs Symposium

About one month ago, I was fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to lecture upon a topic that is near and dear to my heart: Bletchley Park, Enigma, and ULTRA. My lecture was a year in the making and I enjoyed every second. It was a lot of fun jumping back into my notes, re-educating myself, and creating my powerpoint. After months of preparation, I produced about 35 slides and I ended up lecturing for an hour and twenty minutes! But let's back track and I can give you a bit more detail about my lecture. (Above, I have posted a screenshot of the title slide from my lecture.)

Four years ago, now almost five years ago, I began researching Bletchley Park. I've written about Bletchley Park a couple times, so please allow me to re-write what I've posted previously:

Bletchley Park was the center for Allied cryptography during the Second World War. During WWII and even during the interwar period, it was common for countries to send secret diplomatic messages and for other countries to intercept those messages. With the outbreak of WWII, the Germans adopted a special machine called "Engima", which was said to be unbreakable. The machine, which resembled a large typewriter, was truly a work of genius. For more information on the Enigma, click here. 

In response to the Enigma machine, the British knew it was vital to set up a center for code breaking. Located roughly 50 miles outside of London, Bletchley Park was remote and protected form German bombings, and ideally located for recruiting from Oxford and Cambridge. During the war, Bletchley Park was known as "Station X." It was at "the Park", that intercepted German messages were decrypted, analyzed, and sent off to whomever needed the intelligence." That is an extreme oversimplification, but it's a concise summary."

In October of 2013, New York Military Affairs Sympsoium (NYMAS) invited someone to give a lecture about the Enigma machine. Dr. Perry is a mathematician and his lecture was fantastic. Perry's lecture focused on the technological side of the Enigma. He discussed the inner workings, schematics, and mathematics behind the machine. His lecture wasn't really a history of the machine, but more a "how the machine worked", sort of lecture. I thought it was brilliant and frankly, that was an area in my knowledge that was lacking, so I was grateful that someone took the time to really explain how Enigma worked.

One year later, it was my turn to lecture at NYMAS. In my introduction, I stated, "my lecture this evening is not so much about the Enigma machine and it's acquisition --- Dr. Perry spoke about that last October and his lecture was very informative. I like to think that my lecture picks up where his left off. There will certainly be overlaps, that is to be expected, by I hope that my lecture picks up the narrative where his concluded." My goal that evening was to introduce the audience to the world of Bletchley Park, a world that has captured my imagination and a place that I have come to deeply love. A vibrant community filled with young brilliant minds, enemy radio intercepts, and of course --- SECRETS. 

I was humbled and shocked to see how well attended my lecture was. I'd estimate there were about 50 people and it was standing room only!

Creating my presentation was a bit of a struggle because I needed to find the right balance between having the appropriate amount of detail, as well as the appropriate amount of information. By this I mean, I needed to make sure that my lecture was informative, but not overwhelming. As a Bletchley Park scholar, I think all of the details are fascinating, but not everything is relevant. When I first started to design my lecture, I had so much information, that I could have lectured for one week nonstop! That's not good. So, as much as it broke my heart, I had to really sit down and determine what was relevant and what wasn't. 

After months of debate, the powerpoint was done. I am a visual person and I like visible paths and I like to see a coherent train of thought. I also like photographs, so I made sure to have lots of photographs throughout my powerpoint, so as to help contextualize what I was talking about. I designed the flow of my presentation to look like this:

I. Introduction

II. Bletchley Park & Enigma in Popular Culture

III. World War I & Codebreaking During the Great War

IV. Enigma & the Interwar Years

V. Bletchley Park

VI. ULTRA

VII. Bletchley Park Revealed in the 1970s

VIII. Conclusions

The code breakers in Hut 8 (they focused on the naval Enigma) were fortunate enough to get their hands on a copy of the German Short Weather Cipher book and used it to help them break the Enigma daily rotor setting. 

Like I said, I ended up speaking for 1 hour 20 minutes, although I was technically only supposed to talk for 1 hour. As far as I can tell, my lecture was well received. I held my own during the Q&A and afterwards, I received many compliments. I was surprised by the number of people who asked where I received my PhD! How flattering! 

Although I had a marvelous time speaking, for me, the real highlight was meeting my idol, Dr. David Kahn. You may or may not know Kahn, but if you like the history of codes and ciphers, you definitely know him. Kahn rose to fame in the mid-1960s when he published the first complete history of code breaking. He later received a DPhil from Oxford in 1974, where his dissertation focused on German military intelligence during WWII. Long story short, Kahn has written extensively on topics including Enigma, Bletchley Park, and signal intelligence. What does this mean to me? Basically, he is the premier authority on what my lecture was about.

When David Kahn walked into the room, I had butterflies in my stomach. I was nervous and humbled and excited --- all at once! To know that the expert would be listening to me, that's a lot to process! Lucky for me, Kahn told me that he enjoyed my lecture and that he was impressed by how prepared I was! Can't get a better compliment than that, right?

During the Q&A, David Kahn jumped in and answered a few questions

Kahn was gracious enough to personalize his book for me

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed my NYMAS experience. It was a lot of fun and quite invigorating. Normally, I don't have many people to talk to about my passion (except my parents), so to be given a full hour and to be able to discuss my passion with others, it was an amazing. In fact, I'm sad it's over! Furthermore, to meet a historian whom I idolize and be told that he enjoyed my lecture --- it was a dream come true. I guess I'll need to find a new topic and hope that NYMAS invites me back to lecture!