The Father of American Military Cryptology

The Modern Scholar Podcast

Betsy Rohaly Smoot is an intelligence historian interested in early twentieth-century cryptology and communications who has published articles in both Cryptologia and Intelligence and National Security. She spent 34 years at the National Security Agency as an analyst, manager, and, for her final ten years, as a historian in the Center for Cryptologic History. She is the author of the newly released book Parker Hitt: The Father of American Military Cryptology (University Press of Kentucky) and the forthcoming From the Ground Up: American Cryptology During World War I (the Center for Cryptologic History). Betsy holds a BA from Mary Washington College and an MS in Strategic Intelligence from what is now the National Intelligence University.

Betsy and I have crossed paths over the years during the Society for Military History annual conferences and I’m very excited to have her on the show today and hear about her new book exploring the life of Parker Hitt!