A MALVERN man with a love of words had his birthday wish granted thanks to a generous electronic games company.
Jack McQuaid has a large collection of word games and electronic word computers made by Franklin, distributed by Seiko, and for his birthday he was desperate to add a Wordwizard to his set.
The 23-year-old, who is autistic and lives at Options Malvern View, had owned the game – which was made in 1997 but has since gone out of production – twice but each time it had worn out.
Jack visited Seiko’s Maidenhead offices on Wednesday (June 24) to be presented with the game, ahead of his birthday tomorrow (Saturday).
The surprise came about when Mike Milne, his key worker, contacted the company in the hope they could help.
Mike said: “Like many people on the autistic spectrum, Jack can be obsessive about his interests and loves words, word games and electronic word computers.
“He has been desperate to get Wordwizard, so I wrote to the manufacturer asking to see if they had one stashed away in a forgotten cupboard somewhere.
“They almost immediately came back to me to say they had found one of the games. They invited Jack to personally present him with the computer which we weren’t expecting.”
Along with the game, Jack also got to try some of Franklin’s new products and look around the Seiko watch showroom.
Dawn Rooke, Jack’s mum, added: “Ever since the age of five, Jack has been fascinated by words.
“Games like these have transformed his life as from a young age Jack couldn’t speak so he communicated through the use of these games, spelling out what he wanted to say.
“It is brilliant Jack had the opportunity to go to Seiko and I couldn’t thank them enough.”
