The Woman Who Smashed Codes

by Jason Fagone

Fabyan never claimed to be an altruist. “I ain’t no angel,” he said once, “and there are no angels in the New England cotton textile business, and if there are, they will all be broke.” But in one part of his life he did strive toward some kind of greater good, and he wanted people to know it. In his free time, for his own amusement, he had made himself into a man of science. The steel magnates of Pittsburgh collected paintings, old and contemporary masterpieces. Newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst would soon build a 165-room castle in California full of marble statues. Fabyan was thinking bigger. “Some rich men go in for art collections, gay times on the Riviera, or extravagant living, but they all get satiated,” he said. “That’s why I stick to scientific experiments, spending money to discover valuable things that universities can’t afford. You can never get sick of too much knowledge.”