Believe It or Not: A Typo Helped End World War II

Author: Matt Gilligan / Source: did you know?

As World War II raged across Europe, the British knew they had to get the best and brightest minds involved in the war effort if they and their Allies were to be victorious. That’s why a man named Geoffrey Tandy was a bit taken aback when he was summoned by the Ministry of Defence in 1939.

Tandy was a volunteer in the Royal Navy Reserves, but his regular job was as a cryptogamist for the National History Museum. Cryptogamists study algae, and Tandy wasn’t sure where he fit in with the war effort. Tandy then guessed that the Ministry had made a mistake and confused his job with a cryptogramist—a codebreaker. Tandy was pretty much useless to the Ministry and didn’t do much at all for two years until 1941, when something miraculous happened.