Najma Jama

Hi guys, my names Najma and I study Media and Cultural Studies at Middlesex University. It's my first time using Wikipedia so bare with me, can I also mention that I am a MASSIVE Mesut Ozil fan!

Women of Bletchley Park

One of the women of Bletcley Park I want to expand on is:

Mair Russell-Jones [[1]]

My Wikipedia Entry

She wrote the book ‘My Secret Life in Hut Six: One woman’s Experience at Bletchley Park’ that was published in 2014. The book was written by her and her son, she died on the day the book was completed. It was based on her involvement in attempting to break the German Enigma Code. She discusses her experience on working in unconformable conditions, the danger and strain she suffered as a woman during her time at Bletchley Park. Her son, the co-author for this book describes the book as a “ridiculous tale of silence”. The book combines Mair’s first hand experiences and feelings about the war and being part of the secret service. It also included her son’s and other's opinions who knew her from Bletchley Park or after.

The book indicates that in 1998, Mair was given ‘The Secrets of Station X’ written by Michael Smith. Station X contains black and white images of the machines, people and buildings, and the room Mair was situated in which was Hut Six, which was known as the Decoding Room. “Station X – known now as Bletchley Park – was the hub of Britain’s code-cracking effort, where hugely talented mathematicians, inventors and “bright young things” like Mair Russell-Jones worked tirelessly to give the armed forces a crucial helping-hand. As Winston Churchill himself made clear, the accurate information which flowed from Bletchley Park, at a rate which sometimes reached 6,000 messages a day, saved lives and gave Britain a crucial edge in battle.”

The book also highlights Mair’s love for music and her abilities. It is stated that “her parents are members of local choirs and keen to instill a love of music in their daughters”. Furthermore, she claims that “when she was five, she started piano lessons”. Her ambition was to become a concert pianist. Her musical abilities came to use during her time at Bletchley Park because her knowledge of music also helped in her ability to see patterns in passages that needed to be decoded. In the book, Mair Russel-Jones states “the freedom to learn and lead was so liberating”. This suggests that women were on equal footing with men and inequalities were not highlighted when it came to the secret service. In a review of Mair’s book ‘My Secret Life in Hut Six, and about the women of Bletchley, Christensen claims “At its peak in May 1945, more than 12,000 people worked at Bletchley or its outstations, over 8,000 of them women.”

In November 2011, Mair Russell-Jones discussed the war and how it affected her personal life to BBC. She claimed, “I had a boyfriend and a family, and not telling them what I was doing, or even where I was working almost felt as though I was lying to them”. This conveys that she was almost living a dual life, as she was sworn to secrecy about all things Bletchley Park. Whenever she was asked what she did, she would reveal that she worked for the Foreign Office in Bletchley.

Reflection

Wikipedia is an online platform that gives us the power to create pages, edit and post tings.“greater public access to tools for cultural production/circulation and to core information about how society works would simultaneously result from and create shifts in ownership structures.” (Green, Jenkins & Ford, 2013: 162). It enables us to be creative and develop articles that already exist. “the Wiki community has mutated since 2001 from an oligarchy to a democracy” (Ball, 2007). Wikipedia is quite difficult to use, for a beginner, but after playing around it became more comprehensible. Through the various books and news articles I was able to find out that the Women of Bletchley Park played a huge role in the Second World War. It is important to recognise their achievements and it was educating reading about Mair Russell-Jones’ life and her involvement.

I wrote a Wikipedia entry solely on Mair Russell-Jones and her book 'My Secret Life in Hut Six: One Woman's Experinces at Bletchley Park'. This is because It came to my attention that not an awful lot was written about the book she wrote with her son Gethin Russell-Jones. As someone who read quite a few chapters from the book, I can admit it was both touching and interesting. It opened my eyes to the politics then, the pain and overall anxiety she suffered throughout her life. She intended to keep her time at Bletchley Park a secret and kept everyone including her family and children in the dark. The book highlighted her intelligence and musical abilities, these were factors that helped her during decoding and making patterns.

I was able to expand my knowledge of Mair Russell-Jones through looking at other articles and news that linked to her. I was lucky enough to come across an interview she did with BBC News, and she explained her secret mission and Churchill’s praise. In addition, she discussed about coming back to reality, as she was there for four years it was all her life revolved around and coming back home and getting back into the swing of things proved to be difficult. She claims that “"For four years I'd done nothing but thought about German codes, while I worked, while I ate, while I slept. Once it was all over, I think my body just didn't know how to cope anymore.”

I noticed that in her book, she always mentioned ‘groups of girls’ at her school or the women she worked with. In a review of Mair’s book ‘My Secret Life in Hut Six, and about the women of Bletchley, Christensen claims “At its peak in May 1945, more than 12,000 people worked at Bletchley or its outstations, over 8,000 of them women.” . This shows that women were heavily involved in the execution of decoding and breaking codes. This differs from the fact that during that time, women had to leave their jobs to become housewives and look after their families. ‘The glass ceiling is not simply a barrier for an individual, based on the person’s inability to handle a higher-level job. Rather, the glass ceiling applies to women as a group who are kept from advancing higher “because they are women” (Morrison et al., 1992, p. 13).