Before she mastered the secrets of French cooking, Julia Child was enrolled in the school of espionage.

The famous chef let slip the story of her war-era spying in a 2002 autobiography, but the release of thousands of documents from the U.S. national archives on Thursday confirms her participation in a secret organization formed by President Franklin Roosevelt during the Second World War.

Hidden among the 750,000 classified pages released Thursday is a picture of the vast spy network of military and civilian operatives called the Office of Strategic Services.

The archives released a list of 24,000 soldiers, actors, historians, lawyers, athletes, professors, reporters and others who agreed to collect information in an effort to combat the Nazis.

Child is not the only figure who went on to public renown. Others include:

• Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg.
• Chicago White Sox catcher Moe Berg.
• Arthur Schlesinger Jr., a historian and special assistant to President John F. Kennedy.
• Sterling Hayden, a film and television actor who appeared in The Godfather.
• Thomas Braden, author of Eight Is Enough.
• Miles Copeland, father of Stewart Copeland, drummer for the band The Police.
• John Hemingway, son of author Ernest Hemingway.