Although
born in Georgia, David Bryant attended Florida A&M until he joined
the navy in 1942. Following the war he came to Washington and worked
as a statistical clerk for the Census Bureau. He and fourteen other
African-Americans transferred to ASA from the Census Bureau in 1947.
They were assigned to the Russian plaintext traffic processing unit.
From this small cadre of black communications clerks grew a large,
essentially all-black division in the Operations Directorate of NSA.
In 1948 Russian encrypted systems went silent leaving the plaintext
messages as virtually the only form of intelligence coming from the
Soviet Union. This all-black office, which became known as “the
snake pit,” filled a critical void in the Cold War. By 1950, Mr.
Bryant had secured a transfer out of the traffic processing branch,
and was attending Russian language classes preparatory to working as
a translator/analyst in the Russian plaintext branch. Mr. Bryant was
one of the first African-Americans to become a Russian linguist. After
holding several analytic and staff positions, Mr. Bryant joined the
newly established Equal Employment Opportunity office in 1968. While
there he helped expand agency recruitment at traditionally black universities
creating opportunities for other African-Americans. Mr. Bryant retired
in 1968.