I recently finished reading The Debs of Bletchley Park by Michael Smith. I was familiar with
the Park and its inhabitants because of other research I’ve done into the “undercover”
part of the war. Somewhat repetitive because he interviewed many women who held
the same job, the book gives a personal account of life there. For those who
don’t know, Bletchley Park was the central codebreaking location for the
British.
As a former Human Resources professional, I was particularly
interested in the selection process for the jobs. Advertisements were placed in
the Daily Telegraph announcing a contest for crossword puzzle lovers. Contestants
were instructed to complete the puzzle in under twelve minutes! Why would that
be a successful test of skill? Telegraph columnist Tom Chivers said it best in
his October 10, 2014 blog:
“What people who don’t do them don’t realise about cryptic
crosswords is that they’re a battle. They are mental combat between the setter
and the solver: there are strict rules of warfare, but within those rules the
setter will do anything to mislead and confuse the solver. That’s why a
crossword is superior to Sudoku; a computer can set a Sudoku, and a computer
can solve it, but a crossword is human ingenuity versus human ingenuity, wit
verus wit."
On our flight to Florida this week, my husband and I amused
ourselves by doing the crossword puzzles (one labeled easy, the other labeled
hard) in the onboard magazine. It took us approximately twenty minutes to do
the “easy” one, and an embarrassing forty five minutes to do the “hard” one.
Apparently, neither one of us would have been a Bletchley candidate.
How about you? Would you have made the cut?
A freelance writer for over ten years, Linda Shenton
Matchett novella Love's Harvest is available on Amazon. She is currently seeking a publisher
for her series about WWII war correspondent Ruth Brown. Visit her at www.LindaShentonMatchett.com
