Kristie Macrakis
Born(1958-03-11)March 11, 1958
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
DiedNovember 14, 2022(2022-11-14) (aged 64)
Atlanta, Georgia, U.S.
Resting placeCambridge
OccupationProfessor
NationalityAmerican

Kristie Irene Macrakis (March 11, 1958 – November 14, 2022) was an American historian of science, author and professor in the School of History, Technology and Society at the Georgia Institute of Technology. She was the author or editor of five books and was widely known for her work at the intersection of history of espionage and history of science and technology.[1][2]

Biography

Macrakis received her PhD in the history of science at Harvard University. After teaching at Harvard University for a year as a lecturer, Macrakis spent a year in Berlin on an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Chancellor's Scholar for Future Leaders, before taking up a position at Michigan State University where she advanced from Assistant to Full Professor, before taking up a Full Professor position at Georgia Tech.[2]

Prisoners, Lovers, and Spies (2014) and Seduced by Secrets (2008) were her single authored books. Nigel Jones wrote in The Spectator that Prisoners, Lovers and Spies is "beguilingly informative and sweeping survey of hidden communication."[3]Kirkus Reviews named it one of the best nonfiction books of 2014 and called it "lively...engaging" and "An engrossing study of unseen writing and the picaresque misadventures of those who employ it."[4]

Seduced by Secrets was hailed as the "best book" on the Ministry for State Security by Benjamin Fischer in the International Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence,[5] while Joseph Goulden, of the Washington Times, gave it "a five cloak-and-dagger rating. Good reading for the specialist and the layman alike."[6]

Macrakis was also the author of numerous articles, both scholarly and popular. While a graduate student at Harvard she found that the Rockefeller Foundation funded science in Nazi Germany; that work was covered in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 29 October 1986). Her most widely read popular magazine article is "The Case of Agent Gorbachev," published in American Scientist.[7]

Following a brief illness, Macrakis died on November 14, 2022, at the age of 64.[8][9]

Books authored

  • Surviving the Swastika: Scientific Research in Nazi Germany. New York: Oxford University Press, 1993 ISBN 978-0195070101[10][11][12][13][14]
  • Science under Socialism: East Germany in Comparative Perspective. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999 (with Dieter Hoffmann). ISBN 978-0674794771[15][16][17]
  • Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasi's Spy-Tech World. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0521887472[18][19][20][21][22]
  • East German Foreign Intelligence: Myth, Reality and Controversy. New York, London: Routledge, 2009 (with Thomas Wegener Friis). ISBN 978-0415664592
  • Prisoners, Lovers, and Spies: the Story of Invisible Ink from Herodotus to al-Qaeda. New Haven, London: Yale University Press, 2014. ISBN 978-0300179255
  • Espionage. Essential Knowledge Series. Cambridge, London: The MIT Press, 2022. ISBN 9780262545020
  • Nothing Is Beyond Our Reach: America's Techno-Spy Empire. United States: Georgetown University Press, 2023. ISBN 9781647123239

References

  1. ↑ Kate Tuttle. "Kristie Macrakis explores secret messages, invisible ink." The Boston Globe, April 19, 2014.
  2. 1 2 Fuller, Amy (2011). Contemporary Authors (Vol. 305 ed.). Detroit, MI: Gale. ISBN 978-1414460871.
  3. ↑ Jones, Nigel (July 19, 2014). "From slaves' rectums to porn vids, there are few places people haven't tried to conceal secret messages". The Spectator.
  4. ↑ "Prisoners, Lovers, and Spies".
  5. ↑ Fischer, Benjamin (2008). "The GDR's Exceptional Spies". International Journal of Intelligence and CounterIntelligence. 22 (1): 165–174. doi:10.1080/08850600802487034.
  6. ↑ Goulden, Joseph (June 15, 2008). "How did Cold War-era spies get the goods?". The Washington Times.
  7. ↑ Macrakis, Kristie. "The Case of Agent Gorbachev". americanscientist.org. American Scientist. Retrieved 2 September 2015.
  8. ↑ "Kristie Irene Macrakis's Obituary (2022)". Legacy.com. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
  9. ↑ "Celebrating Kristie Macrakis". Georgia Tech School of History and Sociology. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
  10. ↑ Proctor, Robert N. (1995). "Reviewed work: Surviving the Swastika: Scientific Research in Nazi Germany, Kristie Macrakis". The American Historical Review. 100 (2): 545–546. JSTOR 2169100.
  11. ↑ Johnson, Jeffrey Allan (1996). "Reviewed work: Surviving the Swastika: Scientific Research in Nazi Germany, Kristie Macrakis". German Studies Review. 19 (1): 175–176. JSTOR 1431739.
  12. ↑ Hammerstein, Notker (1995). "Reviewed work: Surviving the Swastika. Scientific Research in Nazi Germany, Kristie Macrakis". Historische Zeitschrift. 261 (3): 978–979. JSTOR 27630533.
  13. ↑ Ash, Mitchell G. (1994). "Reviewed work: Surviving the Swastika: Scientific Research in Nazi Germany, Kristie Macrakis". Isis. 85 (4): 727–729. doi:10.1086/357049. JSTOR 235350.
  14. ↑ Hunt, Richard M. (1995). "Reviewed work: Surviving the Swastika: Scientific Research in Nazi Germany, Kristie Macrakis". The Journal of Interdisciplinary History. 26 (2): 313–315. JSTOR 206641.
  15. ↑ Bentley, Raymond (2000). "Reviewed work: Science under Socialism: East Germany in Comparative Perspective, Kristie Macrakis, Dieter Hoffmann". Slavic Review. 59 (3): 649–651. JSTOR 2697357.
  16. ↑ Gurshtein, Alexander (1999). "Behind das Iron Curtain". American Scientist. 87 (4): 379–380. JSTOR 27857888.
  17. ↑ Neander, Joachim (1999). "Reviewed work: Naturwissenschaft und Technik in der DDR, Dieter Hoffmann, Kristie Macrakis". German Studies Review. 22 (2): 347–348. JSTOR 1432126.
  18. ↑ Legvold, Robert (2008). "Reviewed work: Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasi's Spy-Tech World, KRISTIE MACRAKIS". Foreign Affairs. 87 (6): 172. JSTOR 20699411.
  19. ↑ Theoharis, Athan (2009). "Reviewed work: Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasi's Spy-Tech World, Kristie Macrakis". The American Historical Review. 114 (4): 1181–1182. doi:10.1086/ahr.114.4.1181. JSTOR 23883121.
  20. ↑ Davidson-Schmich, Louise K. (2009). "Reviewed work: Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasis Spy-Tech World, Kristie Macrakis". German Studies Review. 32 (2): 436–437. JSTOR 40574830.
  21. ↑ Sarotte, Mary Elise (2009). "Reviewed work: Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasi's Spy-Tech World, Kristie Macrakis". Central European History. 42 (4): 794–795. doi:10.1017/s0008938909991300. JSTOR 40600999.
  22. ↑ Laprise, John (2009). "Reviewed work: Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasi's Spy-Tech World, Kristie Macrakis". Technology and Culture. 50 (3): 723–725. doi:10.1353/tech.0.0290. JSTOR 40345768.
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