Among the phone phreaks, one blind boy who had taken the moniker of Joybubbles had perfect pitch and was able to identify frequencies precisely.
The group had previously used an organ and cassette recordings of tones to make free calls. Learning of Draper's knowledge of electronic design, they asked him to build a multifrequency tone generator, known informally as a blue box, a device for emitting audio tones used to control the phone network. Teresi and several other phone phreaks were blind. A call from Denny Teresi resulted in a meeting that led Draper into the world of "phone phreaks", people who study and experiment with telephone networks, and who sometimes use that knowledge to make free calls. While testing a pirate radio transmitter he had built, Draper broadcast a telephone number to listeners seeking feedback to gauge the station's reception. ĭuring this period, he also worked as an engineer and disc jockey for KKUP in Cupertino, California and adopted the countercultural styles of the time by wearing long hair and smoking marijuana.
He also attended De Anza College on a part-time basis through 1972. He moved to Silicon Valley and briefly worked for National Semiconductor as an engineering technician and at Hugle International where he worked on early designs for a cordless telephone. ĭraper was honorably discharged from the Air Force as an Airman First Class in 1968. In 1967, while stationed at Charleston Air Force Station in Maine, he created WKOS (W-"chaos"), a pirate radio station in nearby Dover-Foxcroft, but shut it down after a legally-licensed radio station, WDME, objected. While stationed in Alaska, he helped his fellow service members make free phone calls home by devising access to a local telephone switchboard. Īfter taking college courses, Draper enlisted in the U.S. He was frequently bullied in school and briefly received psychological treatment.
As a child, he built a home radio station from discarded military components. 2.3 Allegations of sexually inappropriate behaviorĭraper is the son of a United States Air Force engineer.