I'm keeping this post public because I want to have as many people see it as possible. If you're a UK resident/citizen, this is the petition to help save Bletchely Park (home of the Enigma machine/WW2 Codebreakers). It's a really important part of our history, and I personally think it needs help to preserve it.
The petition is
here. It's done via the 10 Downing Street website.
Here's the text from an e-mail I was sent from The Bletchley Park Trust:
Bletchley Park Iconic Codebreaking Buildings in Decay
C Block
Hut 3
Mansion
Hut 6
To sign the petition lobbying the Prime Minister to act to help preserve
Bletchley Park, please go to
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/BletchleyPark/ If you would like to make an online donation to Bletchley Park Trust, please
go to
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/<
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/shop/changeDonate.rhtm/-1>
News Release - 6 June 2008
The true Bletchley Park Story is more incredible than fiction. A desperate
race against time, pitting Britain’s best brains against Hitler and his
chief commanders. The WW2 codebreakers’ mission was to crack the German
Enigma machine and decode other seemingly unbreakable messages. Against
them? Odds of 158 million million million. Their reward? ‘Ultra’
Intelligence that saved Allied convoys carrying essential supplies from U
Boat wolfpacks on the prowl, and played a major part in the North African
and other military campaigns. So effective was Bletchley Park that the
decoded messages sometimes reached the Allies before the enemy Generals.
The astonishing achievements of the codebreakers are believed to have
shortened the war by two years saving countless lives.
Today, Bletchley Park Trust is a charity; conscious of the debt we owe to
the brilliant, unsung intellectual warriors among whom Turing and Welchman
were pre-eminent. The mission of the Trust is to build a world class
Heritage Site and Educational Centre but it receives no ongoing public
funding and relies heavily on its revenue streams from conferences, weddings
and heritage visitors, as well as from its Science and Innovation Centre,
where Bletchley Park has returned to world-leading research after 60 years.
In addition to the Science and Innovation Centre in Blocks A and E, restored
and refurbished in partnership with Milton Keynes Capital Partners, the
Bletchley Park Trust has also restored Block B, as its main museum area, and
Hut 8, former workplace of Alan Turing. It has established an American
Garden Trail; a number of new and fascinating exhibitions and developed
unique mathematics learning resources for students and educators. The
National Museum of Computing will open later this year in the newly
refurbished Block H and a Sculpture Trail is being developed in the grounds.
Heritage Visitor numbers at Bletchley Park are better than ever before,
having increased by 40% over the last two years; the Science and Innovation
Centre is thriving and the conference and wedding business, in partnership
with Zest Leisure Group, is steadily growing.
But now is the time to act to help save Bletchley Park and the Trust are
currently in talks with the Heritage Lottery Fund and other potential
funders. Some of its remaining buildings, where the most important work of
the twentieth century took place, are in urgent need of repair. The iconic
Victorian Mansion requires in the region of £1,000,000 for repairs to the
roof and some of the symbolic Codebreaking Huts are in a desperate state of
decay.
Simon Greenish, Director of Bletchley Park Trust urges people to visit the
Park, saying, “The site is unique and one of the most important remaining
from World War Two. We have exciting plans to develop the Park and save it
for future generations. The more visitors we have helps us to realise those
plans.”
To sign the petition lobbying the Prime Minister to act to help preserve
Bletchley Park, please go to
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/BletchleyPark/ If you would like to make an online donation to Bletchley Park Trust, please
go to
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/<
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/shop/changeDonate.rhtm/-1>
For further information; -
visit www.bletchleypark.org.uk <
http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/shop>
e-mail
info@bletchleypark.org.uk call 01908 640404
Bletchley Park Trust, The Mansion, Bletchley, Milton Keynes, MK3 6EB
*EDIT* - Comments disbled because of anonymous spammers.