Profitable night vision.

My dear, late (he usually was), maternal Grandfather told me as a child the story about Yorkshireman Percy Shaw (1890-1976) who, in 1933, invented Cat's Eyes. The little glass marbles, embedded in pairs, in a white rubber mount in the centre of most of Britain's A class highways.

A long story, so I won't bother explaining all of it here.

Suffice to say that the inventor, once getting happy as a newt after a few too many bevvies one evening, was then obliged to drive home in dense fog. But for a cat he very nearly ended up driving off the road and into a ditch.

The cat was stood at the grass bank of a tight bend in the road. Our hero's car headlamp beam reflected back from the cat's green eyes drawing attention to the sharp turn, thereby preventing a terrible accident.

Our hero, thus inspired by the cat's extraordinary anatomical feature, invented reflecting Cat's Eyes.

Percy Shaw's patent earned him a Penny for every Cat's eye embedded in Britain's roads. Which made him a multi-millionaire. Even in the early 1930's.

My Grandfather noted that it was perhaps fortunate the cat was not walking in the other direction. As what would Britain possibly do with billions of electric pencil sharpeners?!

Mistral's commitment:
Bringing benefits of computerisation to our RAC industry - without the commonly associated problems.

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