Zodiac Part II
The “Button Letter and Cipher” created by the Zodiac and mailed to the San Francisco Chronicle has for almost 37 years remained unsolved, until now. I am pleased to announce that I have solved this cipher and am going to share it with the public and its results are remarkable.
This is a copy of the letter and cipher that the Zodiac mailed to the San Francisco Chronicle:
Picture Source: Zodiac Killer
This is a copy of the map that Zodiac included in his letter:
Picture Source: Zodiac Killer
First we are going to look at the letter. The letter gives important clues as to how to solve the puzzle.
The Zodiac is very angry that no one is wearing his buttons. Buttons can be associated with many different types of functions, but one function stands out above all the rest—political campaigns. When a political candidate doesn’t have very much exposure because the voters do not wear the politician’s campaign buttons, the candidate doesn’t do very well at the polls.
This is the Zodiac’s first major clue for this particular puzzle.
Now for the second major clue:
The Zodiac is claiming that he shot a man sitting in a parked car with a .38 caliber weapon. The weapon that was used to kill cab driver Paul Stine was a 9 mm automatic, a different weapon than a .38 caliber weapon. This means that Zodiac is trying to clue us in on something here.
First, Zodiac talks about “buttons” and how important they are. Then Zodiac talks about a man being shot by a handgun and an individual in a car. In politics, two such assassinations did take place in Zodiac’s time, the two most important assassinations in the latter-half of the 20th Century, the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and his brother Robert F. Kennedy.
Now, to solve the cipher, we must next look at a section of the map that Zodiac included in his letter to the San Francisco Chronicle:
This is the key to solving the Zodiac Button Letter cipher.
The cipher variables are:
Now, using the key which is the cross with 0 at the north position, 3 at the east position, 6 at the south position and 9 at the west position, we will insert the variables in order clockwise and we wind up with the following sequence.
Once all the variables are equally distributed clockwise, the variables at the 6 O’clock position spell “JFK WROTE”.
What has President John F. Kennedy written? He wrote a book called “Profile in Courage” in 1955 which won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1957.
President Kennedy is also best known for being the Commander of PT-109, the famous PT boat during World War Two.
Just as remarkable, Arthur Leigh Allen joined the US Navy in 1957!
But President John F. Kennedy is also famously known for
another written item which turned out to be one of the most famous speeches in
A S K N O T W H A T Y O U R C O U
N T R Y C A N D O F O R Y O U
In the Zodiac button letter above, the Zodiac underlines one word in particular as another clue and proof of the solution:
ASK NOT WHAT YOUR COUNTRY CAN DO FOR YOU;
ASK WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR YOUR COUNTRY.
The word “not” is the only non-duplicate word in the sentence. This is another important clue by Zodiac that he was talking about President John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy. Whether this is indicative of a larger conspiracy is not known, absent the full case evidence.
Conclusion
The Zodiac may be claiming some connection to
the death of Robert F. Kennedy in
The year that President John F. Kennedy’s book
“Profile in Courage” won the Pulitzer Prize in 1957 was the same year that
Arthur Leigh Allen enlisted in the US Navy.
In the Zodiac’s “My Name is Cipher” located here that
I solved, the solution to that cipher was “A Train 8 Blood 13”, which may
translate into “A Train Blood 8:13” which could be in reference to Robert F.
Kennedy’s assassination at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles and subsequent
transportation across the country by train back to Washington, DC, after he was
assassinated.
The cipher could also be providing information
by the Zodiac that he served in the US Navy beginning in 1957.
The cipher solution may be a key of some type
for another cipher or possibly some other mechanism that Zodiac has created.
Zodiac sleuths are invited to discuss this on the forum!
Christopher Farmer
MS, National Security
http://www.opordanalytical.com