Cooperative Living February 2020 - 35

In 1911, a Philadelphia entrepreneur
bought the 701-acre property. He
doubled the size of the house and
turned the farm into a modern
country estate with purebred
livestock. For several decades,
Fauquier County's fashionable
society flocked to the
entrepreneur's elegant parties.
VINT HILL SLEUTHS
During World War I, the U.S.
realized it needed expert
cryptographers for intelligence
gathering. In 1919, code breakers
started intercepting and
deciphering secret cable messages
from foreign countries. The War
Department stepped up surveillance in
1930 with the U.S. Army's Signal
Intelligence Service (SIS).
Soon, the Navy, Coast Guard, FBI and
Federal Communications Commission
added clandestine listening stations from
New Jersey to the Philippines, creating
what author James Bamford called a
" hodgepodge " of intelligence gathering.
Japanese planes bombed Pearl
Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, killing and
wounding more than 3,500 Americans.
In response, the U.S. entered World
War II and Secretary of War Henry L.
Stimson began turning coding chaos and
discord into organized teamwork.
The Army bought Vint Hill
in 1942 and surreptitiously
moved its 2nd Signal
Service Battalion there to
set up a major listening
post. The Army's
Cryptographic School
John DePerro,
chief curator at
the Cold War
Museum, displays
a World War II
image at the
museum.
Girls: The Untold Story of the American
Women Code Breakers of World War
II, " how traumatized she became when
she learned what happened to the men
she and other radio intercept operators
replaced at VHFS. " All the men in that
unit went overseas and died on the
beaches within a month, " the code girl
says in the book.
DePerro says few people today know
Japanese Americans from Hawaii served
at Vint Hill. " These men deserve
recognition for their invaluable
contributions. "
THE COLD WAR
joined the battalion and began teaching
women and men the secrets of signal
snatching.
" Giant intercepting towers and half a
dozen ugly barracks-like buildings soon
disfigured the lovely Blue Ridge foothills,
and here, in rooms filled with desks and
tilted tops, most of the Army's traffic
analysis was done, " according to David
Kahn, author of " The Code-breakers. "
In 1943, Vint Hill Farms Station
(VHFS) eavesdroppers intercepted a
message that Japan's ambassador sent to
Tokyo. The message described in detail
Nazi fortifications along the French
coast. Gen. Eisenhower, the supreme
allied commander in Europe, later
credited VHFS for helping make the
June 6, 1944, invasion of Normandy
successful.
John DePerro, chief curator at Vint
Hill's Cold War Museum, points out
that the Women's Army Corps (WAC)
working at Vint Hill was the dawn of
women serving in the military.
" They knew what they were
doing, " DePerro says.
" When men cycled
in before going
overseas, the
WACs helped
them learn the
fine art of radio
interception. "
One WAC
member told
Liza Mundy,
author of the
2017 " Code
co-opliving.com
After Germany and Japan surrendered
in 1945, the world morphed into the
Cold War. Free-world and communist
nations used spies and coded messages
instead of tanks and bullets.
According to author Bamford, VHFS
operated secretly in Fauquier County
where " four-wheeled Mustangs coexist
with four-legged stallions " and where
small farms dotting the landscape in a
gentle patchwork send " forth from the
rich moist soil corn, soy, and, at a 720acre
secluded estate 10 miles east of
Warrenton, antennas. "
Using rhombic antennas and
monopoles, more than 2,000 men and
women dressed in green and khaki
harvested the crop, processed it through
expensive machines in barns, and
shipped it to a customer in Maryland.
The customer, the National Security
Agency, took all the farm produced.
VHFS also supported CIA and FBI
operations.
" One thing we knew in Army
Operations was we must maintain
security at Vint Hill. " says retired Army
Lt. Col. Randolph Williams, a NOVEC
member who served in the Pentagon
in the 1980s.
VHFS sleuths intercepted the Soviet
Union's diplomatic and military
communications. The Soviets weren't
the only targets - one former Vint Hill
employee confirmed to a U.S. House of
Representatives subcommittee in 1977
that the " giant ear " eavesdropped on
Washington's Embassy Row.
Vint Hill also had two small " safe
houses " in the woods. Bryan Zwanzig,
(continued on page 34)
February 2020 | Cooperative Living | 33
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Cooperative Living February 2020

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