Cambridge Coincidences Collection

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understandinguncertainty.org was produced by the Winton programme for the public understanding of risk based in the Statistical Laboratory in the University of Cambridge. The aim was to help improve the way that uncertainty and risk are discussed in society, and show how probability and statistics can be both useful and entertaining.

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Well I Never!

Professor David Spiegelhalter of Cambridge University wants to know about your coincidences!

Vin Van

I was employed by the municipal government for about 13 years in the transportation department. Early in my career my job was to conduct traffic studies. About my second year in a chap named Vince was hired and we became fast friends, working together until I left. There were all kinds of different studies we undertook, one being Origin/Destination studies. The purpose is to ascertain travel patterns. The method of determining those patterns is to write down the licence plates of the passing vehicles by a field crew stationed at strategic points. Once this was done, somebody would match up the licence plates and calculate who went where. I was assigned to do the matching up on one of the studies; Vince was working in the pod next to me. I came across the personalized plate VIN VAN and immediately told Vince if he ever got a van it should be called the Vin Van. That became his nickname and I still call him that after 25 years. 5 or 6 years after the VIN VAN occurrence, Vince and I were assigned a traffic count together in the downtown area of our city where street parking is at a premium.

Meeting miles from home

A coincidence connected with Australia. We were visiting my Aunt and Uncle in Salisbury, Australia just outside Adelaide. During our visit my Aunt and Uncle took my husband and I on a week’s holiday to several places around Melbourne, Victoria, a 2 day drive away. One of our stops was a small coastal town called Robe. Whilst there we went for a walk on the cliff top and found a collection of classic cars. They had driven all the way from Adelaide on a car rally and amongst the drivers was a woman that my Aunt knew. She was the mother of one of my cousins (Aunts son) school friends. Two days drive away from home and meeting someone from the same school run.

Street Musician

On Saturday 22nd May 2010, after having completed a couple of day’s business trip, I was enjoying a free day in Copenhagen. Strolling near the Tivoli, I heard a street musician playing some really good jazz guitar. On closer examination it turned out he was playing on what appeared to be a rectangular board, about 2 ft long, with 12 equidistant strings on it, with top E on the outsides and bass E in the middle. He wasn’t strumming or plucking;- he played the notes by placing the pads of his fingers on the strings. Like I said, really good. Two days later, on Monday 24th May I packed my bags for another trip, this time to Dublin. Strolling along by the river I heard a now familiar sound. Around the corner I found that same chap, playing the same crazy jazz guitar.

continents apart

The coincident I wish to tell you about involves our son Matthew. Several years ago he went on an 18 month trip round the world, through Europe, Asia, round Australia (twice) and finally America. In Australia he had a campervan and drove from town to town, youth hostel to youth hostel, taking others and sharing petrol etc. On one occasion he was walking down the main street in Alice Springs, in the middle of the outback and almost the dead centre of the continent, when he recognised the young man walking towards him. It was one of his friends who lived not 500 yards from our family home back in the UK. Within a few minutes another familiar face came into view – someone Matthew had worked with a few years previously back home in Essex. The travel companions our son had with him were two girls from a town no more than 6 miles from our home. So within 5 minutes there were 5 people in the middle of Alice Springs who all lived within 6 miles of each other on the other side of the world, all known to Matthew, but not known to each other until that time.

surname duplication

After I discovered my biological father was not the one given on my birth certificate, I investigated the person named on my birth certificate as “father” and found, with indisputable proof that after he divorced my mother, whilst I was still a baby, he married again to someone called Hollingsworth, which is now my married surname. I have yet to investigate any family connection between this family and my husbands. This took place in the 1940's so perhaps not as common as it would be today. </p> <p>

Coincidence or heriditary genes

A whole set of coincidences, some of which may be explained by hereditary, concerns my paternity. At the age of 48 I discovered that the man named on my birth certificate as my father was incorrect but I finally tracked down my biological father who we shall call Fred. By this time Fred had died but I contacted his remaining family which by this time was just a half-brother, David, and his family, two other siblings having died several years previously. Apart from the obvious family likeness there were so many other coincidences. I had been at school with David’s wife. My husband had been at school with David. David’s eldest son was called Matthew - as was our son, (when they sign Christmas cards you could hardly distinguish one signature from another). David had another son (sadly killed in a road accident) who was at the same school as our son Matthew. Our daughter has a gap in her front teeth as did my other half-brother who has died. David’s eldest son is an accountant as is our daughter.

Same Name

This coincidence occurred on our honeymoon, late December 1968. (We are still married!). We went to stay at a large hotel in Bournemouth; we had been to this hotel many times before so the proprietors knew us quite well. They gave us one of their best rooms on the lower ground floor with direct access to the garden. There was only one other room on this floor occupied by a single gentleman named Mr Hollingsworth. My husband’s surname and one I had just acquired? HOLLINGSWORTH!!! Another incident involving surnames. We were going on a fly/coach touring holiday to New England (Boston USA etc.). We arrived at Heathrow Airport and found the courier. When we told her our surname, Hollingsworth, she said she had already ticked us off. It turned out there were another couple on the coach holiday named Hollingsworth. (We investigated but found no family connection at all). The coincidences didn’t stop there. As is the norm on this type of touring holiday every morning on the coach a few announcements are made including birthdays, anniversaries etc. On this particular day it was my birthday and I was duly called to the front of the coach to receive my small gift.

tracing dead relatives

One of the biggest coincident, and the spookiest, was many years ago when I was just starting out on the family history. I decided, on a whim as I was passing, to call in to the local museum which also housed the Essex Regiment Museum. I was trying to find out more about my husband’s grandfather who was killed in WW1. I didn’t even know which regiment he had been in. I found Ian Hook, the curator, who was only in the office a few days a week – first stroke of luck. I was taken to his office where there were 2 elderly ex-soldiers helping with research; they were only there two afternoons a week – second stroke of luck. Dr. Hook looked up the person in question, Walter Charles Hollingsworth, in the Essex Regiment list, not too common a name, but he wasn’t there. The research the two volunteers were doing was looking for “strays”. That is Essex residents who signed up to regiments other than the Essex Regiment.

A Very Morbid set of coincidences

I worked for a number of years as an Industrial control systems Engineer which basically involves writing computer software to automate Industrial processes and over the duration of that carreer, I worked mainly in three types of industrial applications which were Nuclear, Chemical ,and Water.

Three different coincidences

My boyfriend and I were both widowed in 2007 - he lives in Cornwall near Plymouth and I live in Devon about 12 miles from Plymouth. His oldest son (Simon) lives in America with his wife. In 2008 the son went, with his wife, to visit her aunt who lives in Canada. In conversation about the Simon's father's 'new girlfriend' it turned out that the aunt and I had been next door neighbours in 1975 to 1976. Another co-incidence:- Two of my late husband's siblings share the same birthday in October, but are 3 years apart. Yet another coincidence: Whilst holidaying in 2011 we visited Lady Elliott Island in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia. Whilst there we met a very nice couple from Switzerland. They returned to mainland Aus on Thursday, the day before we returned to the mainland on the Friday, back to stay with my boyfriend's parents. On the following Sunday we went to the Boat Club in Hervey Bay to have lunch and there sat the couple from Switzerland that we had met on the island. None of us knew we were all heading for Hervey Bay. Hope of interest

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