Spying in Washington, DC

Politics can get in the way of a lot of things – including my vacation.

After planning for a great week in Washington our plans had to be scrapped and rewritten when the government shut down over a small budget disagreement. Recognizing that thousands of people were experiencing hardship both from not having any income and others from travelling from far away to visit we kept our complaining to a minimum and looked for ways to enjoy ourselves.

With all the monuments closed, the zoo closed, museums closed and parks closed we needed to do a little research for new activities. Top of our new list was the International Spy Museum, a unique venue that exhibits the history of spying through the ages.

The museum breaks spying down historically, showing the evolution over thousands of year to present day. There is an excellent combination of displays, images and interactive stations.

Upon entry each visitor is asked to assume an alias. Cover stories and profiles are provided in the first room and they play an important role as you move through the museum.

Pigeons over Germany

One of my favourite sections was the role of pigeons in World War II. Long before unmanned drones and satellites were used for spying, cameras were strapped on to the chests of pigeons and they were sent off to fly over enemy areas. Many of the resulting photos were edged with images of wing tips but the images were exceptional and provided great advantage to the allies.

 

 Code Play

Given the role codes have played in spying, one entire section was exclusively about different types of codes.

Visitors can learn tap codes. Tap codes are based on a Polybius square, a 5×5 grid of letters representing all the letters of the Latin alphabet. To make the square, the letter K is replaced by C. Each letter is communicated by tapping out two number. The first number indicated the row and the second number indicated the column. X is used to break up each sentence.

You can also try your hand as a Windtalker. Windtalkers were Navajos Indians who used a code based on their native language. Key to the code was that there was no written record of the words and the words where then matched up with other words. To break the code you would first need to learn Navajos and then know what the corresponding words were. It remained unbroken by the Japanese during World War II.

If you are a fan of the most famous spy – Bond, James Bond, the museum also plays host to the 007 Exhibit – Exquisitely Evil: 50 Years of Bond Villains. Definitely worth the walk through.

There are also other opportunities to hone your spying skills including Operation Spy and Spy in the City. Spy in the City is a GPS-guided tour of DC and its neighborhoods with a spy twist and Operation Spy is an hour-long live action adventure. There are age restrictions so check ahead.

It is a great place to spend the day with enough information to keep everyone busy. Highly recommended.

 

800 F Street, NW Washington, DC 20004