Codes, Cyphers and Secret Messages

Last week, BBC Four Extra broadcast a substantial programme about codes and cyphers called Dr. Hannah Fry - Codebreaker.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000fn1n

In it, mathematician and presenter Hannah Fry looked at everything from numbers stations to Sherlock Holmes, and anything in between. She delved into the BBC Radio Archive to present a fascinating selection of programmes all about codes, secrets and ciphers.

RadioUser has covered secret radio messages and number stations from the Cold War era in a mini-series in May, June and July 2018, and we have looked at radios, and the role of radio in propaganda, from the time of the 'Iron Curtain'. In the future, we will also publish articles on the history of spies and radio and on a famous East German radio station of my youth, the Deutscher Soldatensender.

In the meantime, here is a little puzzle for you: This is taken from the book The Voices, by Gordon Adams (RSGB2018). We reviewed this title in RadioUser. Have a close look at the picture from Punch, from 1941. The drawing was entitled The Secret Hope. Have you seen this before? Apart from having a radio in it, can you spot anything out of the ordinary, that would be of interest to a radio amateur or listener? Can you find the secret message, and, even better, can you decode it? Let me know and I'll put you in our Feedback page!

This e-mail will self-destruct in one week. Have fun and check out the paper and digital versions of the magazine. They'll last forever.

Ed Georg