History of the Club

A Potted Jubilee History

To give you some idea of how the club has developed, the history of the club is roughly as follows (with thanks to one of our “oldest” members):

1978	November, NKACC founded by a bunch of blokes (no women at all at the start) looking at their kit micros.Commodore Kym-1, Compkit UK101 et al.
1979	Commodore launch the PET.Most members buy one, and then break off to form IPUG (Independant Pet User Group), which later goes national.Acorn release the System One. No screen or keyboard! Just a 15-key phonepad and a calculator display.
1980	Acorn release the system Three; then the Atom.Sinclair have the ZX-80.
1981	Acorn announce the "Proton", which is later adopted by the BBC as the model "A".Everyone in the club buys a model B.Sinclair launch the ZX-81, which members view as a toy. IBM launch the PC.
1982	Sinclair launch the Spectrum.This one takes off in the club too, and we start getting younger members.
1983	NKACC launches the "Junior branch", meeting in Orpington Civic Halls on a Saturday morning twice a month.Kids are dumped on us whilst mum and dad go shopping. Great success. Remote controlled turtles, video camera image capturing (mono at 320x192). Mac mouse painting was a favourite.
1985	The end of the computer boom, and we close the junior club.
1987	Acorn replace the BBC Master series with the Archimedes, also badged by the BBC.Most of us upgrade, but some of us move towards PCs.
1997	Ten years on, and the Acorn dominance starts to subside, thanks to cheaper PCs and abundance of software.

As for locations:

Start at Charles Darwin School, Biggin Hill.

Occasional meetings at Newstead Woods School, Orpington in school holidays.

Move to Biggin Hill Library when school fees increase 600%.

Move to Beckenham Library when Biggin Hill closes in evenings.

4 months later, back to Biggin Hill; but to the Black Horse.

We need a meeting room, so make use of a Church Hall in Petts Wood.

One night, it was taken(!) so we found a new venue - where we're still located.