Facebook Donates £1 Million To Bletchley Park Museum

Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook has made a staggering £1 million ($1.3 million) donation to the museum at Bletchley Park. It is the same place where Alan Turing and a World War II team of codebreakers thrashed Germany’s Enigma Machine and also saved the world from Nazi tyranny.

According to Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer, they felt “lucky” to be involved in this donation. He quoted, “The work of its most brilliant scientist, Alan Turing, still inspires our tens of thousands of engineers and research scientists today.”

Bletchley Park’s official Twitter handle mentioned the good deed in a post which read, “We have some more good news to share – Bletchley Park has received a generous donation of £1m from Facebook. This vital support will contribute to our ongoing work and help mitigate the financial impact the coronavirus pandemic has had on the Trust.”

The donation came in the wake of the recent announcement about the financial impact caused due to the global Coronavirus pandemic on World War II trust. Facebook’s donation is expected to support the museum’s work for the next two years.

The loss incurred shattered Bletchley Park’s strategies for the future, and they were facing the possibility of laying off one-third of their workforce i.e. around 35 employees. Besides Facebook’s good deed, the UK’s Culture Recovery Fund has also come forward donating £ 447,000.

The donations are overwhelming for the museum and its SEO Ian Standen. He was quick to respond to the donations made and said, “We are very grateful to both Facebook for their generous donation and DCMS for their financial support. Facebook’s donation highlights the ongoing legacy of pioneering technology developed here during World War Two. Whilst the Culture Recovery Fund demonstrates how vital it is to the nation to save heritage sites like Bletchley Park. With this significant support, we at Bletchley Park can weather the current crisis and survive into the future, keeping the doors open for future generations.”

This site helped in defeating Nazism just days after it finally banned Holocaust denial after lettering it festers for many years. Talking about Facebook, it has more than 3000 employees in the UK with more than half of the mentioned figure working as an engineer.

Facebook Europe VP Steve Hatch said, “The historic achievements of Alan Turing and the Bletchley team have benefited all of us greatly, including Facebook, and we’re thrilled to help preserve this spiritual home of modern computing.”

Caroline Dineanage, the minister for Digital and Culture praised Facebook for their generosity and said, “The work carried out at Bletchley Park in World War Two helped shape the country we live in today, and it is vital to preserving this legacy for generations to come. This funding from Facebook builds on more than £400,000 provided by the Government’s Culture Recovery Fund to Bletchley Park Trust and will enable it to continue its important work long into the future.”

 

The Significance Of Bletchley Park

The Bletchley Park museum is located around 55 miles north of London, and it is the place where British codebreakers including, Alan Turing took on Nazi Germany’s notorious Enigma machine. This helped the British force to intercept messages with information on where Nazi Germany was planning their next strike.

At the time of war, the Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS), now known as the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), was located at Bletchley Park.

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The park is also known as the birthplace of modern computing. This is because Alan Turing and Gordon Welchman displayed the potential of mechanizing codebreaking, while Tommy Flowers along with his team, the first large-scale electronic computer of the world. Bletchley Park is now a national heritage attraction and a computing museum as well.

 

Google Has Ties With Bletchley Park

Tech giant Google has ties with Benchley Park. They have previously donated £555,000 i.e. $850,000 towards £15 million towards the renovation. Google has also hosted Bletchley Park content in the past on the ‘Google Cultural Institute’ site including, pictures and testimony.

Time To Wrap Up: 

Facebook’s generous deed will help Bletchley park in monetary terms. In the testing times of the COVID-19 pandemic, many people were left jobless as companies were unable to manage their employee expenses. The wrath didn’t spare Bletchley Park as well, and they had the same option.

However, this aid for Facebook is nothing short of a boon in this torrid period, and Benchley Park expects to come back on track with this help.