TheCodeBreakers
Playfair's unselfish proselytizing for his friend's system unwittingly
cheated Wheatstone of his cryptographic heritage; though Playfair never
claimed the invention as his own, it came to be known in the War Office
as Playfair's Cipher, and his name has stuck to it to this day.
Five years later, an American who at the time was working for a stove
and foundry firm glanced briefly at cryp-tology and produced a single
short piece of work. It opened important new vistas into untrodden
lands—and then sank immediately into a cryptologic obscurity.
The inventor was Pliny Earle Chase, then 39, who, after entering
Harvard as a prodigy at 15, taught in Philadelphia for seven years until
his health forced him into less tiring work in business. In 1861 he
resumed teaching, becoming professor of natural science and then
professor of philosophy and logic at Haverford College near Philadelphia.
He was an absorbing lecturer, particularly in astronomy, and he
annaabi.ee 
