John William Draper

The Phone Hacker

John William Draper John Draper was one of the first well known phone hackers, and the first famous "phone phreak". He was honorably discharged from the US Air Force in 1968 after a posting in Vietnam, and then became an engineer at the electronics company National Semiconductor. One day he noticed that some blind kids, named Dennie and Jimmie, were using the whistle from a "Cap'n Crunch" box to make free long distance telephone calls. They glued one of the holes shut in the whistle, and then blew it into the telephone. The modified whistle produced a pure 2600 Hz tone, which was the standard used by telephone electronics to signal that a call was over. When the telephone system heard the whistle it stopped all long distance charges, even though the call continued until one of the parties hung up. John popularized the use of this whistle, and became known by the hacker handle "Cap'n Crunch". John became infamous, and was arrested in May, 1972 for illegal use of the telephone company's system. He received probation, and then was arrested again in 1976, convicted on wire fraud charges, and spent four months in Lompoc Federal Prison in California. Since then, he has held a variety of positions and given interviews on his experiences during the earliest days of long distance hacking. was born May 5, 1811 in St. Helens, Merseyside, England to John Christopher Draper, a Wesleyan clergyman and Sarah (Ripley) Draper. He also had three sisters, Dorothy Catherine, Elizabeth Johnson, and Sarah Ripley. On June 23, he was baptized by the Wesleyan minister Jabez Bunting. His father often needed to move the family due to serving various congregations throughout England. John William was home tutored until 1822, when he entered Woodhouse Grove School. He returned to home instruction (1826) prior to entering University College London in 1829 On September 13, 1831, John William married Antonia Coetana de Paiva Pereira Gardner (c.1814-1870), the daughter of Daniel Gardner, a court physician to John VI of Portugal and Charlotte of Spain. Antonia was born in Brazil after the royal family fled Portugal with Napoleon's invasion. There is dispute as to the identity of Antonia's mother. Around 1830, she was sent with her brother Daniel to live with their aunt in London. Following his father's death in July, 1831, John William's mother was urged to move with her children to Virginia. John William hoped to acquire a teaching position at a local Methodist college. In 1832, the family settled in Mecklenburg County, Virginia 7 1/2 miles (12 km) east (on Virginia State Route 47) from Christiansville (now Chase City). Although he arrived too late to obtain the prospective teaching position, John William established a laboratory in Christiansville. Here he conducted experiments and published eight papers before entering medical school. His sister, Dorothy Catherine Draper provided finances through teaching drawing and painting for his medical education. In March 1836, he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. That same year, he began teaching at Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia. He did important research in photochemistry, made portrait photography possible by his improvements (1839) on Louis Daguerre's process, and published a textbook on Chemistry (1846), textbook on Natural Philosophy (1847), textbook on Physiology (1866), and Scientific Memoirs (1878) on radiant energy. He was also the first person to take an astrophotograph; he took the first photo of the Moon which showed any lunar features in 1840. Then in 1843 he made daguerreotypes which showed new features on the moon in the visible spectrum. In 1850 he was making photo-micrographs and engaged his then teenage son, Henry, into their production. He developed the proposition in 1842 that only light rays that are absorbed can produce chemical change. It came to be known as the Grotthuss-Draper law when his name was teamed with a prior but apparently unknown promulgator Theodor Grotthuss of the same idea in 1817. Contributions to the discipline of history: He is well known also as the author of The History of the Intellectual Development of Europe (1862), applying the methods of physical science to history, a History of the American Civil War (3 vols., 1867-1870), and a History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874). The last book listed is among the most influential works on the conflict thesis, which takes its name from Draper's title. He served as the first president of the American Chemical Society between 1876 and 1877. in 1976, New York University founded the John W. Draper Interdisciplinary Master's Program in Humanities and Social Thought (Draper Program)in honour of his life-long commitment to interdisciplinary study. In 2001, Draper was designated an ACS National Historical Chemical Landmark in recognition of his role as the first president of American Chemical Society.

John "Captain Crunch" Draper

Formerly a Phone Phreak, now a dentally-challenged and odorous wreck, John Draper once gained fame (and prison sentences) from his skills in manipulating the telephone system. His "handle" came from the inclusion of a plastic whistle in Captain Crunch cereal in the 1960's which could, with proper manipulation, send out a control tone that would affect telephone systems of the time. Of course, Draper didn't actually discover that fact (the honor goes to a blind phone phreak named Joe Engressia) but he was quite happy to not go out of his way to correct people when they claimed he had.This propensity to snag the spotlight got John the first of several prison sentences because of the publication of an article called "Secrets of the Little Blue Box", which was about a telephone device favored by Draper and others to fuck majorly with Ma Bell. Ultimately, Draper went to federal prison three times related to phone fraud and other such charges. The years were not kind for Mr. Draper, as he now resembles how Jim Henson would have looked if he'd lived a little longer and ceased taking any care of himself.For reasons that entirely escape logic, Steve Wozniak (co-founder of Apple Computer) has always held a great amount of respect and honor for Draper, and first sought him out as a student in Berkeley in the 1970's. Given the plans to the Blue Box, Wozniak improved them greatly and started selling them around campus, using a portion of the earned money to fund work that became Apple Computer.Life didn't go as well for Draper; 1980 happened and he ceased doing anything interesting. In this new millenium, he has transformed himself into "Johnny D", creepy old guy that you see at raves in California. He's huge on hugs and if you're a cute enough boy, you might even get one of his special "energy transfer" massages! Turn-offs include cigarette smoke and food that requires chewing.