E57 - Off Duty

Bletchley Park

History

4.8 • 177 Ratings

🗓️ 9 April 2017

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

April 2017

Bletchley Park’s brand new exhibition, Off Duty, High Spirits in Low Times, is now open. It explores what happened outside of the gruelling shifts the thousands of workers did, day and night. Wartime work at the Government Code and Cypher School was stressful and tiring - but the authorities understood it was important to keep staff happy - and healthy. We’ll hear from Veterans who gave an intimate Q&A session, which launched the exhibition.

Also this month, we hear memories from one of the hundreds of Veterans who’ve taken part in Bletchley Park’s Oral History project, about how she spent her precious free time. Barbara Allan, nee Grigg, remembers being in Trafalgar Square, watching Doodlebugs falling, and being told off by a passing officer for not taking cover. This was during one of many trips to London on her days off operating Bombe machines at Eastcote, where she and her friends used to enjoy cheap theatre tickets and dinners for a shilling in the crypt at St Martins in the Field.

Museums at Night makes a welcome return next month, this time exploring the Night Shift. As darkness falls, visitors will get a chance to experience the hush of the huts, just as wartime workers would have done. The last Museums at Night event fell close to Halloween, and podcast producer Mark Cotton went along to see just how spooky the park could be.

Image: ©Bletchley Park Trust 2017

#BPark, #Bletchleypark, #Enigma, #WW2,#Veteran, #History

Transcript

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0:00.0	The
0:07.0	The From the home of the co-breakers and the birthplace of modern computing, this is the Bletchley Park podcast.
0:38.3	Welcome to the April 2017 episode of the Bletchley Park podcast, Off Duty.
0:43.9	A select group of Fletchley Park veterans have returned today to tell the story of how spirits
0:49.2	were kept high in low times. This delightful bunch are having lunch at the moment, but they're here for an intimate
0:55.3	question and answer session and they'll be sharing details of how they spent their precious time
0:59.8	off duty. We'll bring you more from these five shortly. Also coming up in this month's episode,
1:05.2	we'll hear memories from one of the hundreds of veterans who've taken part in Bletchley Park's
1:09.1	oral history project about how she spent
1:11.6	her precious off-duty time. Barbara Allen, Nagrick, remembers being in Trafalgar Square watching
1:17.0	doodle bugs falling and being told off by a passing officer for not taking cover. This was during
1:22.7	one of many trips to London on days off from operating bomb machines at Eastcoat, where she and her friends
1:27.8	used to enjoy cheap theatre tickets and dinners for a shilling in the crypt at St Martins
1:32.1	in the field. More from Barbara in a little while. But first, museums at night makes a welcome
1:37.2	return next month, this time exploring the night shift, as darkness falls experienced the
1:42.5	hush of the huts, just as the wartime workers would have done.
1:45.9	The last museums at night fell close to Halloween and podcast producer Mark Cotton went along to see just how spooky the park can be.
1:59.2	Okay ladies and gentlemen, you're looking out this way way you can see lots of bright lights.
2:05.6	The bright lights of peacetime, we're not under threat at the moment.
2:10.6	If you look behind you, you've got the gloom and the darkness of World War II. In World War II, there was the blackout.
2:20.3	All the lights had to be turned out at night.
2:24.3	Or if lights were on, they had to be covered over with blackout curtains.
	...

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