WEBVTT - Knitting as Espionage, Part One: Secrets in the Stitch 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:27.560 Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:31.000 the show, fellow Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so 0:00:31.240 --> 0:00:34.280 much for tuning in. Let's hear it for the man 0:00:34.360 --> 0:00:39.680 of the hour, our super producer, Max Crochet Williams, Max. 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:44.760 The Pearler Williams. There we give the knit Master Williams. 0:00:44.840 --> 0:00:48.000 Yeah, let's use all the words we learned for this, 0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:49.240 Max the knit. 0:00:50.600 --> 0:00:57.440 The gauge, sock Darner, the froggy Williams. That's prood Frogging's cool, 0:00:58.280 --> 0:01:01.000 not to be confused with we just. 0:01:00.880 --> 0:01:04.920 Said the gauge people. Okay, we'll be the gauge for 0:01:04.959 --> 0:01:05.320 this one. 0:01:05.880 --> 0:01:08.880 That is Noel Brown. They called me, they called me 0:01:09.000 --> 0:01:13.880 Ben Bullen. And today, folks, we're embarking what is on 0:01:14.000 --> 0:01:17.760 what is probably going to be a two part episode. Uh, 0:01:17.959 --> 0:01:21.600 maybe we get into it this way. I mentioned crochet, 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:25.600 which is related to knitting, because I don't know if 0:01:25.600 --> 0:01:29.520 I told you guys, my girlfriend recently got super duper 0:01:29.680 --> 0:01:31.160 into Crocheane. 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:34.800 You know, there might be some knitting enthusiasts out there. 0:01:34.800 --> 0:01:35.880 They'll be blasphemy. 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:39.560 Crocheting and knitting I have nothing to do with one another. Also, 0:01:39.720 --> 0:01:40.880 that might not be true. 0:01:40.920 --> 0:01:44.080 They might completely agree with your assessment there, Ben, but 0:01:44.360 --> 0:01:48.480 I do know some folks that take these crafts incredible. 0:01:48.280 --> 0:01:54.720 Seriously, so seriously, well they should. Yeah, Brandy makes well 0:01:54.840 --> 0:01:58.680 you know, she is an artist, so she doesn't just 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:03.240 crochet doilies or stuff like that. She old not that 0:02:03.280 --> 0:02:08.160 there's anything wrong with that. She also makes crochet characters 0:02:08.639 --> 0:02:13.160 from games and from anime, from animal crossing and things 0:02:13.240 --> 0:02:17.560 of that nature. Now, I'm not gonna tell you folks 0:02:17.600 --> 0:02:20.040 to go buy her stuff, but we would love to 0:02:20.080 --> 0:02:25.160 hear your stories about knitting, because very interested in it. 0:02:25.240 --> 0:02:27.040 Give it to us, give us the linkage. 0:02:27.520 --> 0:02:30.400 Oh no, no, tell for another day. Oh come on, 0:02:30.520 --> 0:02:33.400 all right, I'll bug you about it later. My kiddo 0:02:34.280 --> 0:02:38.160 has been on a bit of a knitting slash crocheting 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:42.600 journey doing something very similar, doing little characters and made 0:02:42.639 --> 0:02:45.280 some stuff that they sell on their d pop and 0:02:45.360 --> 0:02:47.400 it's it's a lot of fun. And also their little 0:02:47.400 --> 0:02:51.000 sis is getting into it as well. Super super super 0:02:51.000 --> 0:02:53.440 cool and very functional because, as we're going to get 0:02:53.440 --> 0:02:56.160 into it allows you to do. 0:02:56.080 --> 0:02:59.840 Things like repair your own socks, which I fully support. 0:03:00.240 --> 0:03:03.600 I think you know this is my eagle scout, weird 0:03:03.680 --> 0:03:08.600 survivalist stuff coming out. But historically in the United States 0:03:09.040 --> 0:03:13.560 there was this gender divide on household skills, right, And 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:18.120 one of the things that I maintain is mission critical 0:03:18.600 --> 0:03:21.400 is if you were dude, you need to know how 0:03:21.440 --> 0:03:23.880 to sew. You need to know just a little bit 0:03:24.120 --> 0:03:28.440 about that art of stringing and nodding stuff, so you 0:03:28.520 --> 0:03:31.000 can like darn your socks, as we say, or you 0:03:31.000 --> 0:03:33.520 can fix a duvet cover. 0:03:33.600 --> 0:03:38.160 Or stitch up a wound. They're very related skills. Sorry, 0:03:38.200 --> 0:03:39.960 I've been watching a lot of The Pit lately. I 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:42.320 got over my ick factor and boil boy do I 0:03:42.360 --> 0:03:46.320 love that show. But if you have an aversion to slicing, dicing, 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:50.080 and blood, not for you, although I do have those things, 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:51.880 and I again kind of pushed through it because the 0:03:51.960 --> 0:03:55.760 characters are just so incredible. Today's episode comes to us 0:03:56.200 --> 0:04:00.280 by way of our brand new research associate Marie Yeah, 0:04:00.320 --> 0:04:06.040 who absolutely wreckshop with this two part research brief, and 0:04:06.200 --> 0:04:07.320 I'm just gonna go ahead and knock it out of 0:04:07.360 --> 0:04:10.480 the way. The title that they headlined it with is 0:04:10.680 --> 0:04:13.160 when Stitch and Bitch was more like Stitch and Snitch. 0:04:19.920 --> 0:04:22.080 I had not heard Stitch and Bitch until recently. It 0:04:22.200 --> 0:04:23.960 is kind of I guess this idea of like a 0:04:24.040 --> 0:04:29.320 group sitting around and sewing and knitting and stitching while 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:33.320 also you know, commiserating about the state of affairs. 0:04:33.600 --> 0:04:38.080 Yeah, it's it's a new way of saying the traditional 0:04:38.240 --> 0:04:41.520 like knitting circle, which was very common, or like you know, 0:04:41.600 --> 0:04:44.080 you have a bunch of people get together and sew 0:04:44.160 --> 0:04:49.960 up quilts from leftover, leftover fabric. It is still, by 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:53.279 the way, it is still technically better to stitch up 0:04:53.320 --> 0:04:56.160 a wound. Don't be a dummy like me. 0:04:56.760 --> 0:04:59.960 Uh did you knit up your wound with like wool? 0:05:00.760 --> 0:05:04.320 I had to duct tape once you know what duct tape. 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:06.240 That's probably not the best one. But I do hear 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:06.960 super glue? 0:05:07.080 --> 0:05:09.480 Is it? Preuper glue works if you have it, Yeah, 0:05:09.600 --> 0:05:13.279 I keep it in. But anyway, let's okay, we got 0:05:13.279 --> 0:05:16.200 to get to this. This is a phenomenal story. So 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:21.440 if you cast your memory back, fellow ridiculous historians, to 0:05:22.000 --> 0:05:25.760 World Wars one and two, then you see a lot 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:33.280 of American society reassessing what they saw as the traditional 0:05:33.400 --> 0:05:36.040 roles of a household. So if you're an American woman 0:05:36.360 --> 0:05:40.880 back in the war periods, it was considered your patriotic 0:05:41.000 --> 0:05:44.800 duty to do things like volunteer for the Red Cross, 0:05:45.360 --> 0:05:49.640 uh to enter the workforce, which was a tremendous opportunity 0:05:50.160 --> 0:05:53.240 that had not been provided in the past. And then 0:05:53.279 --> 0:05:56.560 you had to keep on top of rationing and you know, 0:05:56.600 --> 0:06:02.960 your ration cards grow a victory garden and knitting because 0:06:03.000 --> 0:06:06.680 you couldn't just go to Woolworst and buy stuff who 0:06:06.720 --> 0:06:07.960 could afford it at the time. 0:06:08.120 --> 0:06:10.880 Also turns out wool Worst does not just sell woolen 0:06:11.040 --> 0:06:13.360 woolen goods. This is much more of a catch all 0:06:13.480 --> 0:06:17.599 kind of store. I'm joking that wasn't even funny, but 0:06:18.240 --> 0:06:21.520 it's true. Ben Rosie the Riveter was a huge campaign 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:27.040 aimed at getting you know, women to enter the workforce. 0:06:27.200 --> 0:06:29.279 I will say, I think this is obvious everybody. It 0:06:29.360 --> 0:06:30.640 is kind of one of those things where it was 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:34.600 sort of by necessity. It wasn't like this egalitarian moment 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:37.600 of like you know, wilingness, where all of a sudden 0:06:37.880 --> 0:06:39.719 men were like, you know what, women should be able 0:06:39.720 --> 0:06:42.479 to occupy the same jobs as us. No, all the 0:06:42.480 --> 0:06:44.920 men were just off at war and those jobs needed filling. 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:47.880 Yeah. Yeah, So the powers that be said, we have 0:06:47.960 --> 0:06:51.200 to keep our factories open, correct to fight the Nazis 0:06:51.240 --> 0:06:56.080 and so on. But that did fundamentally change us society. 0:06:56.160 --> 0:06:58.359 We also know this is a story that might be 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:01.680 familiar to some of us. Well, no, there's this long 0:07:01.839 --> 0:07:07.240 tradition of making do with what you have, repairing things 0:07:07.360 --> 0:07:12.440 rather than replacing things. So for quite a long time, 0:07:13.960 --> 0:07:17.800 millions of women, especially in the United States and the 0:07:17.800 --> 0:07:23.200 world overall. We're knitting, but they weren't knitting recreationally. It 0:07:23.200 --> 0:07:27.440 was not a S and B hangout necessarily, it was 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:32.640 an economic necessity to keep your families clothing in good repair. 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:37.600 It reminds me of the Great Depression, horrible name, the 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:42.840 period of time when yeah, flower MANU, I can't let 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:49.320 it go. Flower manufacturers realized that less well to do 0:07:49.400 --> 0:07:53.080 families were taking sacks of flower and making these amazing 0:07:53.200 --> 0:07:56.760 dresses for their kids from them, and so they started 0:07:57.560 --> 0:08:03.200 providing more aesthetic, pleasing patterns. We know that during war, 0:08:04.360 --> 0:08:08.040 millions of women in the United States and abroad were 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:12.440 also knitting stuff for the troops. Like you would volunteer 0:08:12.520 --> 0:08:14.240 for the Red Cross, as we said, but you would 0:08:14.280 --> 0:08:19.160 also maybe volunteer to make warm clothing and socks and 0:08:19.240 --> 0:08:23.480 scarves and gloves for soldiers. You would even knit bandages. 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:28.040 I want to say, similar with Gingham, right, the Gingham craze, 0:08:28.080 --> 0:08:31.120 where that was originally used as more of a household fabric, 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:33.360 you know, for tablecloths and curtains and things like that, 0:08:33.400 --> 0:08:34.760 but then it became one of those we got a 0:08:34.760 --> 0:08:36.760 lot of the stuff around, let's make it into dresses, 0:08:37.080 --> 0:08:39.600 and then kind of became a little bit chic in 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:41.040 its own in its own right. 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:45.200 Yeah, Oh, I like that. I like that citation there too. Man, 0:08:45.360 --> 0:08:49.920 We okay, we know this. It became for a time 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:54.440 during during the war periods, it became pretty common to 0:08:54.640 --> 0:08:59.839 see women knitting at all times constantly. Like people blame 0:09:00.040 --> 0:09:02.680 Pokemon Go. When that first came out, you would see 0:09:02.720 --> 0:09:06.280 folks maybe on a lunch break from their factory job 0:09:06.320 --> 0:09:09.400 and they'd be knitting. Or you might see somebody knitting 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:14.840 while they're literally walking to or from a destination. But 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:18.120 as it turns out, and we can't thank our research 0:09:18.160 --> 0:09:22.600 associate Maria enough for this, some of those people knitting 0:09:22.840 --> 0:09:27.800 during the war years weren't just doing altruistic things to 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:32.400 make sure people had scarves or to make sure people 0:09:32.440 --> 0:09:35.360 didn't have to buy a new set of socks. They 0:09:35.400 --> 0:09:39.160 were knitting as a form of espionage. 0:09:39.880 --> 0:09:43.440 Whoa right, true man, I did know about this, but 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:45.920 I still have to drop the woe because it's wild. 0:09:46.200 --> 0:09:49.120 There's so much stuff in these episodes that absolutely took 0:09:49.120 --> 0:09:51.000 me by surprise. We're going to get into the idea 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:55.640 of binary code and secret messages and all of this 0:09:55.800 --> 0:09:58.800 kind of stuff, not to mention spying for the enemy. 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:01.920 So one thing that's I think important when it comes 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:05.840 to spying is having a front that on its surface 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:09.920 can be seen as unthreatening and innocuous and something that 0:10:10.120 --> 0:10:12.000 would typically be overlooked. 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:15.360 And a ladies knitting group is one. 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:19.560 Of those things because of misogyny exactly, but also it 0:10:19.600 --> 0:10:22.840 reminds me of the monopoly board games that were used 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:28.280 to help people escape pow camps. Yeah, you nailed it there. 0:10:29.280 --> 0:10:34.000 Some spies use their knowledge of knitting and the fact 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:39.360 that knitting was seen as so ubiquitous and innocuous that 0:10:39.400 --> 0:10:44.680 they were able to sneak hidden messages encoded in their artwork. 0:10:44.800 --> 0:10:50.480 Sometimes this was a form of what we call steganography, 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:55.040 which is weaving a message physically into an ordinary object 0:10:55.160 --> 0:10:56.480 like a hair tie or. 0:10:56.440 --> 0:10:59.679 A scarf, or that perhaps stitched into the lining of 0:10:59.720 --> 0:11:03.200 a cod Things like that. Yeah, Yeah, that's something we've 0:11:03.240 --> 0:11:03.680 talked about. 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:05.559 Yeah, exactly. 0:11:05.960 --> 0:11:09.960 And sometimes also it would be a great cover because 0:11:10.240 --> 0:11:13.040 you could be a spy carrying a message, but to 0:11:13.520 --> 0:11:17.760 enemy forces, you're just an average person carrying a knitting 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:21.800 bag with yarn and needles inside. And as Maria says, 0:11:22.080 --> 0:11:24.360 heavens no nothing else at all. 0:11:24.520 --> 0:11:30.160 Honestly here, So let's talk about how wartime spies used 0:11:30.240 --> 0:11:33.760 knitting to get the job done. This cover that we're 0:11:33.800 --> 0:11:36.760 talking about, it couldn't have happened if not for the 0:11:36.880 --> 0:11:43.440 absolute boom in popularity of at home knitting kits or 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:47.280 what have you. Women answered the call to knit your bit, 0:11:47.320 --> 0:11:49.679 which was a slogan that originated as a World War 0:11:49.720 --> 0:11:54.320 One era American Red Cross campaign doing things like you 0:11:54.360 --> 0:12:00.000 mentioned earlier, repairing the linings of helmets, knitting fingerless gloves 0:12:00.320 --> 0:12:03.320 for the troops, repairing things stuff like that. 0:12:03.640 --> 0:12:04.160 Knit your bit. 0:12:04.520 --> 0:12:06.160 So take this thing you already know how to do, 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.079 and use it in more time to further you know, 0:12:09.240 --> 0:12:11.360 the mission of the troops. 0:12:11.559 --> 0:12:16.559 By the way, I love the wartime slang, the wartime 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:20.600 initiatives that were all sort of propagandistic, even you know, 0:12:20.679 --> 0:12:24.439 even for the good guys there was stuff like keep mum, 0:12:24.640 --> 0:12:28.480 she's not so dumb, that said, don't talk to don't 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:32.920 talk loosely because you underestimate women, they might be spies 0:12:33.600 --> 0:12:35.679 or careless talk costs lives. 0:12:36.000 --> 0:12:37.080 Loose lips sink chips. 0:12:37.240 --> 0:12:41.040 Loose slips sink ships. That's a banger, Keep calm and 0:12:41.080 --> 0:12:43.520 carry on. Of course that was the British. 0:12:43.640 --> 0:12:46.559 That was just the overarching attitude of the Brits right 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:48.840 right life philosophy. 0:12:49.400 --> 0:12:53.040 Even last one dig for victory, which is when you 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:55.440 were supposed to cultivate a garden. 0:12:56.160 --> 0:13:00.520 So the victory, Yeah, the aforementioned victory gardens. So we're 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:03.439 seeing a golden age of knitting in the nineteen forties 0:13:03.440 --> 0:13:04.880 and a lot of that had to do with this 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:08.400 whole another slogan, make do and mend and of course 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:12.280 the previously mentioned knit your bit mentality that swept the country. 0:13:12.520 --> 0:13:16.439 So on November twenty fourth of nineteen forty one, people 0:13:16.480 --> 0:13:19.840 were seeing the new issue of Life magazine coming out, 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:22.720 displaying a full size photo of a woman knitting, with 0:13:22.880 --> 0:13:27.200 one short headline how to knit. Included you would find 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:30.439 the basic instructions for knitting, and it came with a pattern, 0:13:30.840 --> 0:13:33.000 not for some sort of doily or some sort of 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:35.480 you know dress for a military vest. 0:13:35.880 --> 0:13:41.280 Hmm, yeah, right, it's not it's not what you would 0:13:41.280 --> 0:13:46.000 expect from previous iterations or patterns, but it also is 0:13:46.040 --> 0:13:49.800 completely in line with the skill set of knitting. You 0:13:49.920 --> 0:13:54.000 also saw the big to dos or prominent people of 0:13:54.040 --> 0:13:57.880 the day endorsing knitting. Eleanor Roosevelt, who was kind of 0:13:57.920 --> 0:14:01.640 the Kardashian of the age, right the first Lady of 0:14:01.679 --> 0:14:05.520 the United States at the time. Her PR team often 0:14:05.840 --> 0:14:10.360 made sure to photograph her knitting, and she had a 0:14:10.520 --> 0:14:14.320 knitting tea party that kicked off the World War Two 0:14:14.400 --> 0:14:15.600 knitting effort. 0:14:15.440 --> 0:14:19.200 Knit for Defense over there at the super humble Waldorf 0:14:19.240 --> 0:14:22.640 Astoria in New York City. That happened in September of 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:25.640 nineteen forty one. Eleanor Roosevelt not to be confused with 0:14:25.680 --> 0:14:28.480 Eleanor Rigby, who was darning her socks in the night. 0:14:28.440 --> 0:14:29.480 When there's nobody there. 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:33.800 This Eleanor became known as the first knitter of the land, 0:14:34.160 --> 0:14:37.560 and New York Times reported on January twenty second, nineteen 0:14:37.640 --> 0:14:40.920 forty two, a helmet for a flying cadet made by 0:14:40.960 --> 0:14:43.480 some devoted woman in a small town far from the 0:14:43.480 --> 0:14:46.040 war is sure to arouse interest in the navy or 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:49.160 air force among the friends of the women doing the knitting, 0:14:49.400 --> 0:14:52.120 and she herself feels that she is an active part 0:14:52.160 --> 0:14:56.720 in the vast conflict. She is not useless, although she 0:14:57.320 --> 0:14:59.560 can do nothing else to help win the war. No, 0:15:00.120 --> 0:15:04.360 that's not good copying like that. It was it was 0:15:04.360 --> 0:15:05.960 doing so, it was going so, well. 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:09.800 Yeah, I'll find the journalist so and then we see 0:15:09.880 --> 0:15:13.520 that again, this is ubiquitous. The eleanor Rigby reference is 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:19.200 great because it shows us how fundamental knitting and darning became, right, 0:15:19.360 --> 0:15:29.920 how abiquitous in this time in society. Later, it's June eighteenth, 0:15:30.120 --> 0:15:33.760 nineteen forty five, so just you know, like three years later, 0:15:34.520 --> 0:15:39.680 General Dwight Eisenhower calls upon the American Cross and Volunteer 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:44.280 knitting efforts, referring to them as the friendly hand of 0:15:44.320 --> 0:15:49.160 this nation, reaching across the sea to sustain it's fighting men, 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:53.280 fighting men. Right, But that's okay, So this is a 0:15:53.320 --> 0:15:57.280 good idea. It's a group effort. Everybody get together to 0:15:57.400 --> 0:16:02.880 fight the baddies. This also means that knitting in wartime 0:16:03.040 --> 0:16:07.440 becomes not a hobby, it becomes a patriotic duty, and 0:16:07.520 --> 0:16:11.280 that makes it ubiquitous. That makes it so commonplace that 0:16:11.320 --> 0:16:16.000 if you are a secret agent, you can blend right 0:16:16.160 --> 0:16:19.760 in as you do your dirty deeds of trade craft. 0:16:19.920 --> 0:16:22.520 Yeah, done dirt cheap indeed, And before anyone, you know, 0:16:22.560 --> 0:16:24.840 gets on our case about you know, looking at the 0:16:24.920 --> 0:16:29.040 pass through a modern lens. Uh And so yeah, I 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:30.880 think it's a thing that you do. It's just a 0:16:30.920 --> 0:16:32.640 thing that you do. I don't know that we have 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:35.120 to give a pass instantly. Just you know, some of 0:16:35.120 --> 0:16:38.000 this stuff is a little problematic, but at the same time. 0:16:39.600 --> 0:16:43.400 It's it was. It was progressive for the time for sure. 0:16:44.040 --> 0:16:48.160 Sure it was regressive, progressive for the time, let's keep it. 0:16:48.200 --> 0:16:52.560 But it was also very again condescending. You know, like, 0:16:52.880 --> 0:16:56.240 look at these ladies working in a factory just like 0:16:56.320 --> 0:17:00.440 a dude, and oh uh oh, I'm the high eluding 0:17:00.680 --> 0:17:05.800 New York Times. Women, you can't do anything, but you're 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:09.000 not useless because you can knit. I would be so 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:11.800 irritated by the media of the day, you know. But 0:17:12.480 --> 0:17:15.760 like you were saying, no, we've got to we've got 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:20.360 to note some things that come up in our previous 0:17:20.440 --> 0:17:24.400 explorations on the science and art of trade craft, which 0:17:24.440 --> 0:17:28.280 is house spy spy in our sister show stuff they 0:17:28.280 --> 0:17:30.880 don't want you to know. There's a great shout out 0:17:30.880 --> 0:17:32.680 here that Maria gives us. 0:17:32.760 --> 0:17:35.119 I love this one. It's such a good scene center. 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:37.919 I think people might be familiar with a Tale of 0:17:37.960 --> 0:17:40.560 Two Cities, right, It was the best of times in 0:17:40.600 --> 0:17:42.840 the worst of times, and a really important character in 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:48.080 that book was Defarge, a very powerful woman, but yes hidden, 0:17:48.320 --> 0:17:53.080 hiding in plain sight and exercising her power in the shadows, 0:17:53.160 --> 0:17:54.560 which is kind of by design. 0:17:54.680 --> 0:17:58.359 Right, So let's set the stage. Madame Defarge Tale of 0:17:58.400 --> 0:18:02.880 Two Cities. She sits outside of her wine shop in Paris, 0:18:03.200 --> 0:18:06.439 and she knits a scarf. But for those who know 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:09.919 what to look for, there are messages in that scarf. 0:18:10.000 --> 0:18:15.400 She is secretly stitching hidden names, creating, again with steganography, 0:18:15.760 --> 0:18:21.879 not stenography, steganography a register of aristocrats and enemies that 0:18:21.960 --> 0:18:25.359 are going to later be executed by the guillotine during 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:29.200 the French Revolution. And even though this is an excellent 0:18:29.280 --> 0:18:33.800 fictional character, the use of coded knitting is real, and 0:18:33.840 --> 0:18:37.879 we know that actual genuine spies in the real world, 0:18:37.960 --> 0:18:43.160 people like Elizabeth Betley and Phyllis Lettour, did indeed take 0:18:43.200 --> 0:18:47.200 a page from Madame Defarge and conceal messages in their 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:48.320 knitting projects. 0:18:48.400 --> 0:18:51.360 Yeah, that's part of the resistance. So let's just talk. 0:18:51.160 --> 0:18:55.080 A little bit about the the procedural aspects of knitting 0:18:55.080 --> 0:18:59.359 and involves interconnecting sliding loops of yarn used to create 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:04.280 stitches that form a textile aka piece of fabric made 0:19:04.359 --> 0:19:09.359 from interwoven pieces of yarn or thread or what have you. 0:19:10.200 --> 0:19:14.560 There are two very important fundamental kinds of stitches that 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:16.200 go into this craft. 0:19:16.640 --> 0:19:20.919 Yeah, You've got the knit stitches k and it stitches, 0:19:21.400 --> 0:19:24.760 and they resemble the letter V in that fabric. And 0:19:24.800 --> 0:19:28.679 then you've got the pearl stitches puurl that are a 0:19:28.920 --> 0:19:32.359 reverse knit stitch. Those are the things that look like 0:19:32.520 --> 0:19:35.800 bumps in the fabric. So you got your v's in 0:19:35.840 --> 0:19:40.000 your bumps one hundred percent. And it turns out that 0:19:40.040 --> 0:19:44.719 you can use those v's and bumps as ways of 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:50.920 incorporating hidden messages through the use of what I mentioned earlier, 0:19:51.320 --> 0:19:55.639 something called binary code. Think about Morse code. Very simple 0:19:56.880 --> 0:19:58.320 building blocks. 0:19:57.880 --> 0:19:59.760 Of these types of code, whether it be ones and 0:19:59.880 --> 0:20:02.200 z zos or dots and dashes, right. 0:20:02.600 --> 0:20:03.520 Yeah, exactly. 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:07.919 And this can sound more complex than maybe it actually was. 0:20:08.000 --> 0:20:10.560 In practice. You could use, to your point in lil 0:20:10.640 --> 0:20:14.080 stitches as kind of a data marker. So you purl 0:20:14.080 --> 0:20:17.119 a stitch right, you make a bump, and that represents 0:20:17.160 --> 0:20:21.199 the arrival of a certain person. But you drop a stitch, 0:20:21.320 --> 0:20:24.879 creating a hole in your fabric, and that may represent 0:20:25.119 --> 0:20:30.240 the person leaving. So you really it depends on what 0:20:30.320 --> 0:20:32.800 kind of signals you want to send and what the 0:20:32.880 --> 0:20:39.440 complexity or sophistication of those signals would be. So for example, 0:20:39.440 --> 0:20:45.199 in this in this hypothetical scenario, the person who is 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:49.399 trying to recover this information already knows, you know, like 0:20:49.640 --> 0:20:54.600 Lord Batten von ham On Sandwich is the person they're 0:20:54.640 --> 0:20:57.720 looking for to arrive or depart. So now if you 0:20:57.920 --> 0:21:01.400 are our knitting spy, you don't have to figure out 0:21:01.560 --> 0:21:05.520 a way to use bumps and v's to spell out 0:21:05.520 --> 0:21:09.000 the name Lord Matton Mountain ham On Sandwich. You just 0:21:09.080 --> 0:21:11.880 have to say the person we're looking for has arrived, 0:21:12.160 --> 0:21:13.720 the person we're looking for is gone. 0:21:13.840 --> 0:21:17.160 It's brilliant for sure, and I mean and this type 0:21:17.200 --> 0:21:20.800 of code is still very much in use today. Ones 0:21:20.840 --> 0:21:26.400 and zeros used to encode things like images in digital 0:21:26.400 --> 0:21:31.679 form JPEGs, our audio in digital form MP three's. If 0:21:31.720 --> 0:21:34.120 you stripped it down to their fundamental layers, you're going 0:21:34.200 --> 0:21:38.399 to see series of binary code used to encode things 0:21:38.440 --> 0:21:42.320 from the analog world into digital form. So almost all 0:21:42.400 --> 0:21:47.360 modern digital computer data interactions depend on binary code. So 0:21:47.560 --> 0:21:52.800 binary is very much the same as knitting. These combinations 0:21:52.960 --> 0:21:57.159 of ones and zeros or v's and bumps or dots 0:21:57.160 --> 0:22:01.200 and dashes. In hand knitting, knit one pearl one represented 0:22:01.200 --> 0:22:04.640 as K one P one is a fundamental technique for 0:22:04.760 --> 0:22:08.639 the craft, and it is also inherently a binary system 0:22:08.920 --> 0:22:12.560 in machine based knitting that's used you know, to mass 0:22:12.680 --> 0:22:17.720 mass produce things. Patterns are in fact defined by ones 0:22:17.720 --> 0:22:21.920 and zeros or yes no logic, which are very much 0:22:21.960 --> 0:22:25.280 the same exact building blocks that would go into the 0:22:25.320 --> 0:22:26.879 fundamentals of computing. 0:22:28.320 --> 0:22:34.680 And research Associate Maria, please don't We're not the brightest 0:22:34.720 --> 0:22:39.680 crayons in the box, but don't think your your joke escaped. 0:22:40.119 --> 0:22:43.160 I noticed there you have this titled as K one 0:22:43.359 --> 0:22:49.480 P three, which is a common knitting instruction, So our 0:22:49.560 --> 0:22:52.800 research associated is sending us a code and a puzzle 0:22:52.920 --> 0:22:56.680 as well. Yeah yeah, this, I mean I love this stuff. Man. 0:22:56.760 --> 0:23:03.119 This lends itself naturally to hiding messages In things like 0:23:03.359 --> 0:23:07.440 Morse code, the system of dots and dashes, you can 0:23:07.640 --> 0:23:13.359 use knit and pearl stitch combinations to spell out a 0:23:13.440 --> 0:23:17.880 hidden message within something as simple as a hairtie. Your 0:23:17.920 --> 0:23:21.720 pearl stitch can be a dot, and then three consecutive 0:23:21.760 --> 0:23:26.080 pearl stitches could represent a dash. So if you needed 0:23:26.119 --> 0:23:30.560 to actually spell out the name of Lord montbatten ham 0:23:30.600 --> 0:23:34.199 On von ham On Sandwich, then you could do it 0:23:34.560 --> 0:23:38.119 by employing Morse code via fabric. There were also things 0:23:38.160 --> 0:23:42.560 we could call cousins of this tactic knoed yarn or 0:23:42.760 --> 0:23:49.000 specific yarn color changes knitted into a fabric. So then 0:23:49.240 --> 0:23:51.720 instead of having to have a bunch of pearls and 0:23:51.960 --> 0:23:56.439 v's or bumps and v's, you could just change a 0:23:56.720 --> 0:24:00.800 specific part of the fabric color or the thread or 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:05.280 the yard. That could also very efficiently provide the signals 0:24:05.320 --> 0:24:05.800 you needed. 0:24:12.560 --> 0:24:14.840 So let's talk a little bit about knotted threads in 0:24:14.880 --> 0:24:18.639 this instance, spies with hide messages by tying little knots 0:24:18.680 --> 0:24:23.600 into strands of yarn, with each knot placement representing a 0:24:23.800 --> 0:24:27.720 unique code. So the knotted thread could be an espionage 0:24:27.720 --> 0:24:29.800 tool in its own right, but it could also be 0:24:29.920 --> 0:24:35.080 cast onto knitting needles right and turned into a knitting 0:24:35.119 --> 0:24:38.919 project carried out by a secret agent in a knitting bag. 0:24:39.640 --> 0:24:41.320 So for the knotted. 0:24:41.000 --> 0:24:44.960 Message to be read, the receiver would also have to 0:24:45.080 --> 0:24:47.320 first know how to unravel the scar which is almost 0:24:47.440 --> 0:24:49.800 like what do they call that, like a sifer, not 0:24:49.840 --> 0:24:53.000 a cipher, But there's like the key that you need in. 0:24:53.040 --> 0:24:54.760 Order to trek a one time pad. 0:24:54.960 --> 0:24:56.080 So I don't know something like that. 0:24:56.119 --> 0:24:58.919 I guess I'm just thinking about the you know, when 0:24:58.960 --> 0:25:03.719 we're talking about things like the famous Enigma computer system 0:25:03.840 --> 0:25:06.280 that was I believe Alan Turning had something to do 0:25:06.320 --> 0:25:08.600 with there. You know, there is like a sort of 0:25:09.480 --> 0:25:11.200 there's a name, God damn it, what is the name 0:25:11.240 --> 0:25:15.160 where you in order to like have it's like a specific. 0:25:15.000 --> 0:25:17.879 It's a one time pad, right, the way number stations 0:25:18.040 --> 0:25:21.200 work today, you have to have the cryptographic key. 0:25:21.680 --> 0:25:24.199 Cryptographic key, I think is the term that I was 0:25:24.760 --> 0:25:27.440 poorly digging for, but it's something along those lines. You 0:25:27.520 --> 0:25:29.359 kind of have to in order to even interpret the 0:25:29.359 --> 0:25:30.960