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ERNIE, the famous number generatorERNIE, the famous number generator
ERNIE, the famous number generator

During the 1990s around 1,000 people worked for National Savings at the offices in Marton.

The site became famous for being home to ERNIE, which was moved there from its original base on Moorland Road, St Annes.

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ERNIE was invented by one of the original Bletchley Park code breakers in 1956. Since then the machine has generated the numbers for prizes worth approximately £16bn.

Workers at the National Savings officesWorkers at the National Savings offices
Workers at the National Savings offices

Since 1957, there have been four generations of ERNIE. With continuous advances in technology, each has become faster and smaller.

The original ERNIE took more than 100 days to complete a draw, compared to around five hours today.

ERNIE moved into the new Moorland Building on the Marton site in 2010, where around 450 people still work.