Last week I paid a belated visit to the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley Park, a 5 minute train journey from Milton Keynes. Bletchley Park has a fascinating history and remained Britain’s best kept secret during World War Two. Codenamed ‘Station X’, Bletchley Park was home to an army of over 8,500 code breakers (most notably Alan Turing) who helped save countless lives by shortening the War by two years. Churchill held the base in high regard and described the codebreakers as ‘the geese that laid the golden eggs that never cackled’.
Nestled in the north-west corner of the park lies the NMoC, an entirely volunteer-led institution run solely on the passion and enthusiasm of its members. Open on Thursdays and Saturdays the Museum collects and restores computer systems developed primarily in the UK. The NMoC has many computers up and running, playing original software and it is their aim to show complete systems without any need for emulation. Their latest gallery shows the evolution of personal computing, from the PDP-8 to the iPhone. I had a quick go on ‘Pengi the Penguin’ on the BBC Micro after being lured in by it’s hypnotic soundtrack that provided the background music for the gallery:
A museum volunteer bringing a PDP-8 back to life…
In addition to personal home computing the museum also features displays on calculators, abacuses and slide rules.
The Large Systems room features an ICL 2966, once used by Tarmac in the early 80s and is currently being restored with help from Fujitsu:
The Electronic Office room has a display of word processors and computers used in the workplace:
One of the busiest areas was the Flight Simulation room that lets visitors get hands-on with MS Flight Simulator:
The highlight of the Museum is the Collosus machine, first used to crack Nazi messages on 5th February 1944. The Colossus was the first electronic digital programmable computer, fed data by continuously spooling punch tape. Long excluded from the history of computing due to it’s secrecy, information about Colossus began to appear in the 1970s. Mark II of the Colossus at the NMoC was rebuilt over fifteen years from diagrams, old photographs and memory and is an imposing sight when running:
With plans for expansion underway including new galleries exploring the internet, super computing and a shop, it’s quite astounding just how much can be achieved with a small group of volunteers and a limited budget. One new room that sounds particularly interesting is the ‘Artist in Residence’ studio. The first Artist in Residence will be Pixelh8 aka Matthew C Applegate, a chip tune musician who creates new works from reprogrammed vintage computers. His latest commission by the NMoC, ‘Obsolete?‘, is an audio/visual study of the people, machines, and history of the museum. Here’s a taster of his superb work:
New galleries and exciting new plans mean I’ll definitely be paying the NMoC a return visit but the future of Bletchley Park is under threat. Several of the buildings at the base are in need of repair and unlike most National Museums, receives no government funding, running purely on donations and ticket sales. It’s predicted the Park only has ‘two to three more years of survival’ and this unique, historic landmark is in desperate need of external aid. To find out more about saving Bletchley Park and to sign the petition visit www.savingbletchleypark.org.