Lila Brownberg - one of only 18 “girl operators” in Canada

The breakout hit The Imitation Game shed some light on the mystifying world of WWII cryptoanalysis cracking the Nazi Enigma code; however, civilian wireless operators performed multiple roles including the tracking of submarines.

In December 1945 Chief of the General Staff, General Charles Foulkes, expressed the value of wireless intelligence in a confidential memorandum to the Canadian government entitled “A proposal for the Establishment of a National Intelligence Organization.” This laid the foundation for the Canadian Intelligence as it is known today.

One such civilian wireless operator was Lila Brownberg, a Saint John native born February 25^th, 1925.  Lila worked first at the Ottawa Monitoring Station, before moving to continue her work in Victoria, BC. She was one of only 18 “girl operators” in Canada.

The Ottawa Monitoring Station on Merivale Road

Lila’s charge while at the Ottawa Monitoring Station was monitoring the German Submarines in the Gulf of St Lawrence. In his book “Best-Kept Secret, Canadian Secret Intelligence in the Second World War” John Bryden relays what this job may have looked like:

“Everything depended on the quality of equipment, the personnel and speed. U-boat messages were notoriously brief - as little as twenty-two seconds. An operator might spend hours hunched over his radio set, his head clamped in padded earphones, ears numbed by an incessant hiss. Then suddenly the static would leap to life in staccato of Morse code. The man's hand would slam onto a buzzer and an assistant would jump to the teletype machine, banging the frequency numbers out on the keys. Within a couple of seconds, the person in Bermuda would begin his (D.F.) search."

Operators at work at the Ottawa Monitoring Station 

Following her position at the Ottawa Monitoring Station, Lila was offered a post aboard a merchant ship; however, her mother refused to allow her to go. Perhaps a blessing in disguise since this type of post was notoriously dangerous. Instead, she accepted a job monitoring Japanese Submarines off the coast of Vancouver Island. Operators who were selected for this position had to learn “Katakana” code, consisting of 76 characters.

Lila rode her bike from Ottawa to Victoria to continue her work as a civilian operator.

To learn more about Lila and the efforts of the Saint John Jewish community during the war, visit the Saint John Jewish Historical Museum.

See here for details on location and hours of operation.