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The Olympic Torch is coming to Milton Keynes and World War Two Codebreaking Centre Bletchley Park has been named as one of the special host locations it will visit along the way for a photo opportunity.
On 9 July, the Olympic flame will visit Milton Keynes and Bletchley Park will be inviting local school children to welcome this global icon on behalf of the communities of Bletchley and Milton Keynes.
Bletchley Park is one of just a few landmarks and special activities to be announced today and Milton Keynes one of over 1,000 villages, towns and cities announced by the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) through which the Olympic Flame will be carried by Torchbearers during the London 2012 Olympic Torch Relay which is presented by Coca-Cola, Lloyds TSB and Samsung. LOCOG has worked closely with representatives from a number of sectors in Buckinghamshire to include these on the route and the majority of other special events and activities will be confirmed next year as we aim to build further excitement and anticipation much closer to the time of the Torch Relay.
On 27 July 2012, the eyes of the world will be on London for the Opening Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games as the Olympic Flame arrives at the Olympic Stadium for the lighting of the cauldron to signify the start of the London 2012 Olympic Games.
In the build up to the start of the event, the Olympic Flame will make its journey from Greece and arrive in the UK on 18 May 2012, ready for the Olympic Torch Relay to begin the following day. Representing peace, unity and friendship, the Flame will start its 70-day journey around the UK towards the Stadium carried by 8,000 inspirational Torchbearers.
Andrew Geary, Leader of Milton Keynes Council (MKC), said: “We are proud to confirm that on 9 July the Olympic Flame will reach Milton Keynes.
“Torchbearers will carry the Olympic Flame through Milton Keynes and Bletchley Park will host a welcome on behalf of their surrounding communities. The Olympic Torch Relay will shine a spotlight on the people in the borough and demonstrate that the Olympic spirit is alive and well.”
Simon Greenish, CEO of the Bletchley Park Trust, welcomed today's announcement, saying, "We are delighted and honoured that the Olympic Torch will be visiting Bletchley Park next year. It is symbolic that 2012 also marks the Centenary of Alan Turing's birth; Turing himself being a world-class athlete of Olympic standards.
“Bletchley Park's inclusion in the Torch Relay is a fitting tribute to the achievements of Turing and all his codebreaking colleagues.”
Sebastian Coe, Chair of LOCOG said: “‘We are thrilled to confirm that Milton Keynes will act as host locations for the Olympic Flame, extending an invitation to people in the borough to welcome the Olympic Torch Relay during its journey around the UK.
“This is the UK’s moment to shine and I want to encourage people across Milton Keynes area to start planning how they can be part of this once in a lifetime opportunity and show their support for the inspirational Torchbearers chosen to carry the Olympic Flame as we count down to the start of the Olympic Games.”
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from the Heritage Lottery Fund Grant for the restoration of codebreaking huts.
A landmark victory for the Bletchley Park Trust is today announced with a grant of £4.6 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) towards the regeneration of Bletchley Park
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After sixty six years of secrecy GCHQ to present declassified document
to the Bletchley Park Trust and the only survivor of the four Codebreakers who wrote it
On Sunday 4 September a historical moment will take place as GCHQ present Bletchley Park Codebreaker Mavis Batey with the History of Abwehr Codebreaking, dubbed “Batey, Batey, Rock and Twinn” after its four authors, Keith and Mavis Batey, Margaret Rock and Peter Twinn. A document Mavis Batey was told would never be declassified and has not set eyes upon for sixty-six years.
At the end of the war each Bletchley Park section wrote its history. The reports of Hut 8 and Hut 6, covering German Naval, Army and Airforce Codebreaking, have already been released but the report relating to the German Secret Service, the equivalent of MI6, remained classified. GCHQ has released hundreds of thousands of Second World War documents, but only one other technical history – ‘The General Report on Tunny’. GCHQ is understandably cautious about releasing technical histories: surprisingly, some wartime methods are still relevant today. Special thanks are therefore due to GCHQ which has been involved in a considerable amount of work in clearing it for release.
The history covers the work of ‘Intelligence Services Knox’ (‘ISK’) at Bletchley Park, whose head until his premature death in February 1943 was the renowned Dilly Knox, about whom Mavis has recently written an excellent biography, ‘Dilly: the man who broke Enigmas.’
Mavis Lever, as she was before her marriage to Keith, was not quite 19 when she arrived at Bletchley in May 1940. Later entrants to GCCS undertook a six month course at the Inter-Services Special Intelligence School at Bedford before trying to solve machine ciphers, but she was thrown in at the deep end. She was greeted by Dilly with “Hallo, we're breaking machines. Have you got a pencil? Here, have a go”. He then handed her some sheets of gibberish made more difficult by his scrawls, and expected her to get on with it. Lesser mortals would have given up, but despite finding it ‘all Greek’ initially, Mavis was soon a key member of the ISK team.
Mavis was one of only about three skilled female cryptanalysts at Bletchley, together with Margaret Rock in ISK, and Joan Clarke in Hut 8. Her invaluable contribution to ISK’s work led Dilly to write, “Give me a Lever [Mavis] and a Rock [Margaret] and I will move the Universe”.
The release of this impressive history will rightly help to ensure that all those who worked in ISK will “ne’er be forgotten”.
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On Thursday 25 August, an eclectic mix of leading software development practitioners, employers and ICT teachers and technologists met at Bletchley Park, considered by many to be the birthplace of modern computing, to discuss the question of where the next generation of computer programmers is going to come from. A pilot initiative was launched seeking volunteer software developers from industry to support school teachers who would like to learn how to program.
Masterminded by a Patron of the Bletchley Park Trust, Jason Gorman of Codemanship, a London-based software development training and mentoring company, and sponsored by ThoughtWorks and the BBC Academy, the event heard presentations from leaders in this field. Attendees agreed that as many people who can help as possible should get involved with the Computing At School group to add to the momentum of their initiatives and help ensure a clear direction, and were unanimously behind Jason Gorman's Teacher-Practitioner Exchange pilot program, which will aim to connect teachers who want to learn how to program with experienced volunteer software developers who can coach them. The pilot program will start in late September and run until June 2012, after which talks may begin to scale it up under the auspices of Computing at Schools (CAS) and the British Computer Society (BCS).
As well as debating hot topics in the field of computing at school and beyond, attendees also enjoyed an especially technical tour of Bletchley Park and The National Museum of Computing, soaking in the atmosphere and history of a place and a time when Britain led the world in computing.
The timing of the summit couldn't have been more perfect
, said Jason Gorman, “with Google CEO Eric Schmidt raising the issue of programming in schools the next day in his MacTaggart lecture in Edinburgh. With greater media attention, and a weight of initiatives gathering momentum, many who attended the summit are feeling like a victory is now realistic, and closer than we thought.
If groups like Computing At School and the Raspberry Pi Foundation have their way, those days could be back within a generation.
Simon Greenish, CEO of the Bletchley Park Trust, welcomed the initiative, saying, “Bletchley Park is where the modern world began. Seventy years on, it is only fitting that that the Bletchley Park Trust fully backs this renaissance in tech education to ensure that the tradition of British technological innovation continues by supporting future generations”.
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Bletchley Park Ltd
Bletchley Park is world famous for it's involvement in the second world war, as a centre for codebreakers. Most famously, the Enigma and Lorenz codes were broken there by British codebreakers. Milton Keynes is proud to be home to such a historic site as Bletchley Park and we encourage anyone to visit and take in a piece of history.