Short answers, pulled from the story.
Arthur Scherbius applied for a patent covering a ciphering machine that used rotating disks on the 23rd of February 1918. He and E. Richard Ritter founded the firm Scherbius & Ritter to develop this technology further.
Marian Rejewski received German cipher materials from French intelligence in September and October 1932 to reconstruct internal connections using permutation theory. His team built replicas called Enigma doubles, invented a cyclometer, and produced Zygalski sheets to defeat plugboard settings by January 1933.
Polish representatives met with French and British military intelligence at Pyry just south of Warsaw on July 26th and 27th 1939 to share decryption techniques. They provided equipment including Zygalski sheets and cryptologic bomb machines to each delegation before security protocols forced the Cipher Bureau to destroy records.
Three intact Enigma cipher machines belonging to German Army and Air Force forces were captured between April 8th and the 10th of June 1940. Operations began on the 17th of May 1940 at the British intelligence center located at Bletchley Park where decrypted messages received the codename Ultra.
Current flows from battery through depressed bi-directional keyboard switch into plugboard connections before entering entry wheel and passing through wiring inside three or four installed rotors. The signal enters reflector unit which returns current back through rotors via entirely different path before reaching another switch to light appropriate lamp.