The public-face of the ISDC is the Milesham Organisation, which is ostensibly a not-for-profit body created by a wealthy nineteenth-century industrialist, Sir Charles Milesham. To the public the organisation appears to be a well-funded research institute studying climate change, but in fact it is an elaborate cover for the aspects of the ISDC’s operation which must take place in the open.

original establishment

The Milesham Organisation was genuinely established in the late 19th century by Sir Charles Milesham.

Sir Charles was a wealthy industrialist who built his fortune from a number of factories renowned for their pollution and toxicity. Becoming remorseful in his later years at the impact his factories had on those living in surrounding towns, and inspired by the success of the London sewer program in eliminating cholera, he bequeathed the bulk of his fortune to establishing the Milesham Organisation.

The original aim of the organisation was "to advance through scientific discovery and apply through great construction works means for the protection of the working classes from the scourge of industrial imposition upon their living conditions".

The foundation was mismanaged and plundered by the surviving Milesham family (who resented the bequest of their inheritance) and the organisation ceased to be viable within a decade having achieved none of its stated aims, although it continued to exist as a legal entity.

re-establishment

The Milesham Organisation was resurrected in the late twentieth-century by a legal team assisting the ISDC's International Oversight Board. The board was looking for a plausible cover for the financing and operation of what would be a very obvious operation - the construction of an orbital space station and the space launches needed to supply it.

The extensive damage to government records suffered during the World War II bombing of London provided cover for the fabrication of documents and bank accounts which appeared to establish that the Milesham Organisation lived on as a moribund but extremely well-endowed organisation. All the organisation now needed was for a successor of Sir Charles to step up and assume his great-great Grandfather's legacy.

That successor was William Milesham, whose father had emigrated to Australia with his family in the late 1950's. Approached with the news that his great-great grandfather's organisation had not only survived its neglect but prospered, he co-operated with efforts to re-establish the organisation as a climate research body.

Mr Milesham actively participates in the governing of the new Milesham Organisation but remains unaware of the hidden program that his organisation provides cover for.

major work

The focus of the new Milesham Organisation’s work has been a program to construct and operate an orbital research station - the Atmospheric Climate Research Orbital Space Station (ACROSS). The intent of the station is to allow substantial research into climate change, with the aim of developing strategies to minimise the impact of such change - seen as a direct continuation of the Milesham Organisation's original aims.

The Milesham Organisation undertakes enough actual climate change research to maintain its cover, but the ACROSS station is actually a heavily disguised orbital dockyard for the construction and maintenance of the ISDC's interstellar vessel.