44. The Beale Cipher Mystery

In this episode, we talk about the Beale Cipher Mystery with Dan. The Beale Papers was a pamphlet published in 1885, detailing a story that took place in the 1820s and 1840s about a man named Thomas J. Beale. After disappearing, the contents of a strongbox he left at a hotel were opened in 1845, revealing three pages of ciphertext and a letter explaining the ciphertext pages. It sparked a 175+ year long treasure hunt. This is one of Barnabas' favorite mysteries in Cryptography, and we already discussed some about it in episodes 5 and 11. In the special story, Steve and Bob bot go trick-or-treating... only to discover that they get something other than what they asked for.
 
This episode is a part of the Kids' Listen Halloween Sweeps. You can find the whole playlist at https://medium.com/kidslisten/kids-listen-halloween-sweeps-2024-364571f88427 and https://www.instagram.com/p/DBuHaYkzePE/?img_index=1
 
The background music used in this episode was "Comedy Detective" by OYStudio, "Dramatic Suspense" by Ashot-Danielan-Composer, "Disco Tokyo" by Bio Unit (in the clips from episode 11), "Cyber Anxiety" by HoliznaCC0, "Game Over 1" by HoliznaCC0, and "My Sensei At Their Max" by Amethyst Music. Our theme is "Mosquito" by Caspar Babypants.

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 You can find Dr. Gareth's work at drgarethmoore.com. He has released many puzzle and cipher related books for kids, as well as a lot of stuff for adults, too. 

You can find BunnAmigos Podcast wherever you find good podcasts, or under the "Recommendations" tab on our website!

Chapters

• 1:03 Intro
• 3:21 The Story of Thomas J. Beale
• 5:58 Background & Inconsistencies
• 13:34 Reading of the Plaintext of the 2nd Page
• 15:36 The Codebreakers Still on the Case
• 16:36 Story
• 20:43 Motives: Why Would it be a Hoax?
• 22:24 Appearances in Media
• 23:09 My Opinion
• 23:48 Outro