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In 1966, not only did England win the World Cup, but
we began the custom of using a "good luck" mascot. That year saw
World Cup Willie appearing everywhere. Forty years on, our team
may have failed to match up to their counterparts from the Alf
Ramsay era, but we still had World Cup Willie – oops, I mean we had
World Cup Billy! This Billy, however, wasn’t a toy mascot, but former Dial-a-Cab calltaker and son of DaC Chairman Brian, Billy Rice! During Billy’s time at DaC, he became an Assistant Systems Supervisor, but did it whilst also taking Media Studies at University. When QPR "nut" Billy left DaC several years later, he found himself literally doing the job of his dreams – running the Queens Park Rangers official website and in the process, turning it into one of the most popular football websites in the country with more "hits" than most Premier league teams were getting. It was only a matter of time before he would get noticed by bigger fish, the only question being whether he would be able to bring himself to leave his beloved QPR? He always said that it would take something special to pull him away, |
WORLD CUP BILLY!
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"something special" turned up in the form of Premium TV and editing
all the football matches that they were responsible for – and that
was an awful lot! He is now a Senior Producer with the company. But that wasn’t all. He was also asked to go to Germany for the complete duration of the World Cup and to put his views onto a website designed especially for the event! His "daily bulletin" pulled in thousands as he was seen and heard interviewing fans of all nationalities and giving his views on England’s progress – or lack of it! These interviews weren’t the type the BBC and ITV were putting out, these were |
with
ordinary fans with their tears and their laughter, ordinary people
who had paid to get to Germany and then paid hugely inflated ticket
prices to go and see the matches. As for Billy and his "work" of watching the World Cup over its whole one-month tenure including every England game, their penalty shoot-out demise and the Italy v France Final, his only comment to Call Sign was: "Well someone had to do it and I suppose dad was too busy!" The site should still be up; click on the "video" section at his World Cup website on http://www.germany2006.tv |
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THANK YOU DAC DRIVERS - from Alissa |
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Alissa Cook, daughter of
Dial-a-Cab driver Alf Cook (A62), has asked Call Sign
to thank all those DaC drivers who sponsored her efforts in the
Flora London Marathon in aid of the Micro Anapthalmic Children’s
Society (MACS). DaC donations came via the office and from EC5
(before it became non-physical) and totalled over £300. Micro-anapthalmia and anapthalmia are rare conditions that affect a minority of children from birth and occur due to a failure of the early eye development causing ‘absent eye’ (anaphthalmia) or ‘small eye’ (microphthalmia). The cause of the condition is thought to be predominantly genetic, but research suggests that in some cases exposure to toxins such as pesticides early in pregnancy can be responsible. |
 Alissa
shows her medical for completing the flora marathon. The drink
was also well deserved!
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