Lambros D. Callimahos

Lambros Demetrios Callimahos (born December 16, 1910 in Alexandria , † October 28, 1977 ) was a Greek-American cryptologist in the US Army .

Youth and education

Born in Alexandria to Greek parents, the family immigrated to the United States when he was four years old. His father was a journalist . His main interests at school were chemistry, physics and medicine. He showed no interest in music until the age of 14. This changed when he High School in Asbury Park visited.

He graduated in the subject Law at Rutgers University in accordance with the wishes of his father, but later attended at the age of 19 years, the Juilliard School and obtained in 1933 a degree there. Although he started at the bottom of the class, he became head of the class in his sophomore year on the advice of his teacher Arthur Lora . After graduating, he continued his studies in Europe .

Musical career

He made his musical debut in Munich in 1935 , where he was announced as a master flutist . He also played a work by Bach in Munich in Vienna and in the autumn of the same year , which consisted of seven sonatas and his own arrangement for flute and harpsichord of the Suite in B minor . Subsequently he toured for two years with concert presentations by Europe and was at the Mozarteum appointed professor.

In April 1937 he made his US debut at the Town Hall in New York City . He toured both Europe and the United States during this time.

Second World War

In 1941, he joined the US Army in the hope that his interest in cryptography could be of use.

He taught Italian and cryptanalysis at Fort Monmouth . He registered for a Japanese course and served as Signals Intelligence Officer for the India-Southeast Asia area in New Delhi .

Later career

After the end of World War II, he was assigned to the Army Security Agency , as assistant to William Friedman . When the National Security Agency was formed, both men joined it. In the 1950s he developed the CA-400 course (which he taught until 1976), an extension of Friedman's own labor-intensive course. Graduates of the course were designated internally as members of Callimaho's so-called Dundee Society and could count themselves among the elite of the NSA's cryptanalysts. During these courses, he also developed an exercise in cryptography and radio traffic analysis known as the Zendian problem at the NSA. He also revised the classic work of Friedman Military Cryptanalysis in order to write his own text Military Cryptanalytics (published 1957 to 1977).

In 1955 he founded the NSA Technical Journal and served as a technical advisor to the magazine until the end of his career.

Health problems forced him to retire in 1976.

Web links

• NSA page on Lambros D. Callimahos