Adelaide Hawkins (née Mulheran) (March 6, 1914- July 10, 2008) was a

cryptologist This is a list of cryptographers. Cryptography is the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of third parties called adversaries. Pre twentieth century * Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi: wrote a (now lost) book ...

at the

Office of Strategic Services The Office of Strategic Services (OSS) was the intelligence agency of the United States during World War II. The OSS was formed as an agency of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) to coordinate espionage activities behind enemy lines for all bran ...

(OSS) during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

and the

Central Intelligence Agency The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

(CIA) during the

Cold War Era The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because ther ...

Biography

Hawkins was born in

Wheeling, West Virginia Wheeling is a city in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Located almost entirely in Ohio County, of which it is the county seat, it lies along the Ohio River in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains and also contains a tiny portion extendin ...

. Her father was a machinist, but his work was not enough to support the family, so she lived with an aunt to ease financial strain. One year after graduating high school, Hawkins married Ed Hawkins. The couple had three children. Ed Hawkins worked for the Army Signal Corps Reserves and was assigned in Washington, D.C., where he began studying cryptography and cryptanalysis for the signal intelligence group's extension program. Hawkins joined her husband in his training after she became interested with the work of the crypto analysis community in Washington.

Career

When a new unit was being set up at her husband's workplace, she was asked to join as the coordinator of information. Her first briefing was given by

James Roosevelt James Roosevelt II (December 23, 1907 – August 13, 1991) was an American businessman, Marine, activist, and Democratic Party politician. The eldest son of President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt, he served as an official Secret ...

, son of President

Franklin Delano Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

. Beginning in December 1941, Hawkins managed the agency's message center in

Washington D Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered ...

C, specializing in secret codes, or ciphers. In March 1942, she was approved to become a Junior Cryptanalyst in the Office of Coordinator of Information. She helped train spies working behind enemy lines in communications. She went on to work with the

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...

. At one point during her time at the CIA, she became acting Chief of the Branch of Cryptology. However, she was only promoted to this position because they were holding it for someone more qualified. She was a member of the “petticoat panel,” an effort by the CIA in 1953 to “to study the problems of professional and clerical advancement to determine…whether they believe there is any discrimination as such against women for advancing professionally.” Many of Hawkins' documents and reports from her time at the

are included in the declassified CIA database titled "From Typist to Trailblazer: The Evolving View of Women in the CIA's Workforce."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hawkins, Adelaide 1914 births 2008 deaths American women in World War II People of the Office of Strategic Services People of the Central Intelligence Agency