For the 4Oth annual dinner EXCS put together a display showing 40 years of CUCC. This took the form of 35 A1 panels with photographs, newspaper cuttings and extracts from journals, newsletters and logbooks. It was also noted that it was the 65th anniversary of caving at Cambridge (Long's explorations), and the 10th anniversary of ExCS. Brian Heys (secretary in 1949) and Ron Rushton (President in 1949) were contacted and contributed material. Dr. Marjorie Sweeting, the first Senior Treasurer of CUCC, wrote from Oxford relating how she took a part in setting up OUCC after she left Cambridge. We were fortunate to welcome to the dinner, from the early years, John Gillett (1959), Trevor Faulkner (1960) and David Heap (1960). Also in touch were Bob Pyke (1959) and Joe Duxbury (1965).

The display did not claim to be an official history of the club, and if the plans to produce a book go ahead, then it would benefit from a written account. The first twenty years of the club have already been covered in two articles appearing in 'Cambridge Underground'. 'Half a Century On' by Nick Reckert in C.U.72 covered the history of the Troglodytes and 'A History of the club 1949-1969' by Pete Bowler in C.U.Vol 1, no. 5 gave a year by year account. Both of these were drawn on to cover the early period of the display, together with Mike Perryman's collection of Long's photographs in C.U.79.

In 1968 the nucleus of what was to become 'Northern Branch' and the Ex-Cambridge Speleologists were at Cambridge. Members of ExCS, together with some earlier CUCC members, provided photographs, newsletters, correspondence and other material covering the period from then up to the present. Material from the logbooks, minutes books and journals was also used, though it was difficult to represent everything of note, and the most recent material was not available. In fact the logbooks from 1981 appear to have been lost from the library. People's personal logbooks provided much interesting reading but there was not time to select many extracts. Lack of time also prevented much emphasis on expeditions, even though these are where CUCC does most of its original work. After a spate of expeditions in the '50s and early '60s there was a lull before the Pyrenees were attacked, followed by Austria which has been visited almost every year since 1976.

We will now try to produce a book based on the display material but this may take some time. If anyone has any contributions to make please contact ExCS.