Archives(Just a start. These will be added to throughout 2011/12)

I started by uploading as pdfs and compressing them so they can be read with Acrobat 10. I am now uploading the http://www.c4835149.myzen.co.uk/wp-content/themes/vacstuds/images to Shutterfly as jpegs. Let me know which format you prefer.

Scanning these documents, many of which I have not seen for decades, has been a walk down Memory Lane for me. What strikes me is how much Vacational Studies has developed over the years, but how almost all the photos could appear in the latest brochure and seem as fresh as they were on the day they were taken. How well I remember getting a bucket of water thrown over Stefan for the 1982 brochure and taking Otto to the highest point on a fire escape to get the sky shot for the 1978 brochure. The fun, the laughter, the sheer joie be vivre of the youngsters who have been to our Courses is the same whatever the year. But what social and technological changes have occurred in this time. Those were the days before the computer and mobile phone: the days before fax even, when telex was as hi-tech as it got. Quotes, even in the 1998 brochure, refer to ‘letter-writing’ as the way to keep in touch. Skype and Facebook have changed everything.

The format of the brochures from the ’80s and ’90s was a concertina into DL envelope-size which is not the easiest for an A4-based scanner. The information section was separated from the ‘news’ part.
The ‘news’ went only to those were with us that year and, reading between the lines, I can see why. I used the ‘news’ to say, sometimes cryptically, what I thought. In those politically less correct times, I can see why the staff loved spotting the barbed comments. Nowadays I use ‘IGM’s page’ knowing that only those who are really interested will penetrate so far into the site.

I see, too, that some of the wording I use is unchanged since the beginning. It has
stood the test of time. The Course is basically what it always has been. I am adding to the
brochure front covers below. Click on them or the text to read the whole thing. Remember – the photos in the brochure are those of the year before…