COMPUTER CONSERVATION SOCIETY & BLETCHLEY PARK TRUST
Our Rebuild Project has the benefit of being supported by the Computer Conservation Society (the CCS)
The CCS is a co-operative venture between the British Computer Society, the Science Museum of London, the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, the National Museum of Computing (TNMoC) and the Bletchley Park Trust.
The CCS was constituted in September 1989 as a Specialist Group of the BCS. It is thus covered by the Royal Charter and the charitable status of the BCS.
The C.C.S is the body behind the Rebuild with the Bletchley Park Trust has provided the space and any other facilities that we might need. The funding of the Bombe Rebuild is controlled through the C.C.S and is kept entirely separate from Bletchley Park and for that matter any other Rebuild Project.
In July 2014 the original rebuild team were formed into Trust Turing-Welchman Bombe Rebuild Trust (TWBRT)
The C.C.S was initially supported jointly as a Sub Group of the British Computer Society and by the Science Museum. Now it also receives considerable support from The Museum of Science & Industry in Manchester
One example where C.C.S. has been very much involved is in the Rebuild of the Ferranti “Baby”, properly known as the Small-Scale Experimental Machine (SSEM) of June 1948. This became the Manchester Mark 1 a year later in 1949. That in turn became the prototype for the Ferranti Mark 1. The “Baby” was the world’s First Stored Program Computer.
1998 saw the official switch-on of the ‘Baby’rebuild exactly 50 years after the original first operated.
Chris Burton was the main driving force behind this project. He is a founder member of the C.C.S. and sits on the committee, which I now have the honour of joining.
VISIT BLETCHLEY PARK
The Bombe Rebuild has now moved to the Computer Museum on the Bletchley Park site. The full name is the National Museum of Computing http://www.tnmoc.org/
Demonstrations take place every day that the Computer Museum is fully open. Please see the Main TNMoC WEB site for up to date opening times
We explain some of the History surrounding the Building of the Bombes at Letchworth by the British Tabulator Machine Company, (BTM). As most readers will know BTM, was originally tied in with IBM, but later became ICT then ICL then Fujitsu. As explained elsewhere the project name used for the Bombes in Letchworth was Cantab. As most people making the Bombes were only told what they needed to know, they would not have heard the word Bombe used until after the war and maybe not even then.
The Bombe Mock-Ups produced for the filming of Robert Harris’s novel ‘Enigma’ were delivered to Bletchley Park