The Real Life Spy Behind Charlie And The Chocolate Factory
The Real Life Spy Behind Charlie And The Chocolate Factory
Spies Steal Willy Wonkas Secrets
How many remember the original Charlie and the Chocolate Factory? I am not referring to the movie, but the book inspired by Rolad Dahl.
In the novel is a character named Slugworth, who is one of Willy Wonka's rival chocolatiers. Slugworth sent in spies to steal the secret recipes to Wonka's amazing treats, posing as workers for Wonka. Having obtained these, he began making a plagiarized invention, stolen from Wonka. The work of Slugworth came close to ruining Wonka's factory. Wonka was forced to close his factory and fire all his workers. A few years later, Wonka's factory began working again (operated exclusively by Oompa-Loompas) and his work continued to dominate the candy industry, with no rival able to plagiarize his work, and keeping the factory off-limits to the public, so no spies can infiltrate.
The story was originally inspired by Roald Dahl's experience of chocolate companies during his schooldays. Cadbury would often send test packages to the schoolchildren in exchange for their opinions on the new products. At that time (around the 1920s), Cadbury and Rowntree's were England's two largest chocolate makers and they each often tried to steal trade secrets by sending spies, posing as employees, into the other's factory. Because of this, both companies became highly protective of their chocolate-making processes. It was a combination of this secrecy and the elaborate, often gigantic, machines in the factory that inspired Dahl to write the story.
Whats more interesting about the story isn't that Dahl created an iconic book that lead to a series of books and two blockbuster movies. The more interesting part of this story is that Dahl himself was a spy!
Roald Dahl was a real-life James Bond style Spy
Before he gained fame by putting pen to paper Dahl, was a real life spy!
Dahl, was a real life spy. Dahl led an extraordinary life in America during the Second World War as a philandering James Bond-style spy with a "stable" of women. Yes, you got it right! Apparently motivated by a combination of duty and lust, Dahl slept with countless high society women while gathering intelligence in the United States.
Dahl had fought as a fighter pilot earlier in the war, until injuries grounded him. He then worked for a secret service network based in the United States called British Security Coordination. It had been initially established to promote UK interests in the United States and to counter Nazi propaganda.
Dahl's secretive role went against the grain because he was a terrible gossip who frequently betrayed confidences, according to his family and friends. His daughter Lucy admitted: "Dad never could keep his mouth shut."
Despite Dahl's reputation as one of the biggest Playboy in America and his inability to keep a secret, he was said to have passed on several useful pieces of intelligence, including his belief that President Franklin D. Rooseveldt was having an affair with Crown Princess Martha of Norway, who had been granted asylum by the US.
"And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you, because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely of places." Roald Dahl
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