Olicana Telephone Company

Credit Card Scam

The OTC have been made aware of a very clever credit card scam reported by the Lostock Hall Neighbourhood Policing Team in Lancashire. Read the detail here and be careful!

Timble Inn

Important Information For Visitors To Borrowdale

JK has just returned from a visit to the Lake District and discovered a notice posted in Borrowdale to the effect that the footpath from Seathwaite to Stockley Bridge is affected by a closure order from 14 September 2009 for 3 months for bridge repairs - presumably to Stockley Bridge. It looks from the wording as though it will not be closed all the time, just when works are in progress. However anyone relying on that stretch of footpath on their route would be advised to check. Exactly where to check is not clear - Tourist Information? If anyone finds out the best place to check, please email the OTC and the information will be posted on this site. Similarly, if anyone discovers the work is completed, let us know. To view the footpath closure notice, click here -  Borowdale Notice

Silverhairs Website

Silverhairs is a site dedicated to help older people with their computing, whether it is problems with their software (programs) or hardware (the computer itself).  The site has developed over the last 7 years and now averages 20,000 contacts a month. The author, who says he has 26 years experience with IBM compatible personal computers, is a “silver surfer” himself and judging from what he says on his site, is willing to help on individual problems if you email him. So, if you are having computer problems or indeed almost any "technological" problems and need advice see http://www.silverhairs.co.uk. When you get there, go to the Site Map to find what you want. If you do get in touch, tell him you heard about him via us.

Starting in 1941, an increasing number of British airmen found themselves as the involuntary guests of the Third Reich, and the Crown was casting about for ways and means to facilitate
their escape.. Now obviously, one of the most helpful aids to that end is a useful and accurate
map, one showing not only where stuff was, but also showing the locations of 'safe houses'
where a POW on-the-lam could go for food and shelter.

Paper maps had some real drawbacks -- they make a lot of noise when you open  and fold them, they wear out rapidly, and if they get wet, they turn into mush.

Someone in MI-5 (similar to America 's OSS ) got the idea of print- ing escape maps on silk.
It 's durable, can be scrunched-up into tiny wads, and unfolded as many  times as needed, and makes no noise whatsoever.

At that time, there was only one manufacturer in Great Britain that had perfected the technology of printing on silk, and that was John Waddington, Ltd. When approached by the government, the firm was only too happy to do its bit for the war effort.

By pure coincidence, Waddington was also the U.K. Licensee for the popular American board game,Monopoly. As it happened, 'games and pastimes' was a category of item qualified for insertion into 'CARE packages', dispatched by the International Red Cross to prisoners of war.

Under the strictest of secrecy, in a securely guarded and inaccessible old workshop on the
grounds of Waddington's, a group of sworn-to-secrecy employees began mass-producing
escape maps, keyed to each region of Germany or Italy where Allied POW camps were.

When processed, these maps could be folded into such tiny dots that they would actually fit inside a Monopoly playing piece. As long as they were at it, the clever workmen at Waddington's also managed to add:

1. A playing token, containing a small magnetic compass

2. A two-part metal file that could easily be screwed together

 3. Useful 20 amounts of genuine high-denomination German, Italian, and French currency,  hidden within the piles of Monopoly money!

British and American air crews were advised, before taking off on their first mission, how
to identify a 'rigged' Monopoly set -- by means of a tiny red dot, one  cleverly rigged to  look like an ordinary printing glitch, located in the corner of the Free Parking square.

Of  the estimated 35,000 Allied POWS who successfully escaped, an estimated one-third
were aided in their flight by the rigged Monopoly sets.. Everyone who did so was sworn to secrecy indefinitely, since the British Government might want to use this highly successful ruse in still another, future war. The story wasn't de-classified until 2007, when the surviving craftsmen from Waddington's, as well as the firm itself, were finally honored in a public ceremony.

It's always nice when you can play that 'Get Out of Jail' Free' card!

Help Find Madeleine McCann

As most people must be aware, the little girl Madeleine McCann who was abducted in Portugal is still missing. The family have put huge effort into finding her and their latest idea is to "chain letter" a poster which shows a close up of her face and particularly her left eye which has a distinguishing mark. The request is that everyone email everyone in their address book with the poster. The picture of her eye from the poster is below.

The poster which is in PDF format can be downloaded here.

http://www.findmadeleine.com/pdf/Madeleine_WEB_POSTERS.pdf

The McCanns have also released the following computer enhanced image to show how she might look in 2009 now age 6.

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Rights of Way

There is a danger of Rights of Way being lost. More detail is given on the Discovering Lost Ways page.

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Our First Fifty Walks

If anyone would like a copy of the Director of Special Project's weighty tome, "The First 10 Years and the First 50 Walks", setting out the full details, this is available as a Word document (215kb) if you email us. Don't worry, its free!

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