Foreword To The YRC Journal

by J.D. Armstrong

Although it gives me great pleasure to write this foreword I do so with mixed feelings, for in gratefully acknowledging the time and effort put in by the Editor, and several other members, I have to accept that this may be the last copy of the YRC Journal.

A journal has been part of the YRC tradition since the beginning. Our first journal was published in 1899, recording in the best tradition of our forefathers their exploits on the hills and underground. Times change however. There are now monthly periodicals providing the space and opportunity for deeds of outstanding achievement to be recorded and broadcast to the mountaineering and the caving fraternity. The need for club journals to record such deeds is no longer necessary. Times also change in other ways. The men who make up the YRC are no longer in the forefront of rock climbing and few are in the forefront of caving. As readers will quickly perceive, the articles contained in this journal cover a range of activities rather different from those recorded in earlier editions. With printing costs continuing to rise, the committee has had to ask itself whether what the YRC is doing in the 1980’s is so significant that it deserves such resources being allocated to it.

In common with other mountaineering clubs we do not have as many young members as we would like, yet there is much vigorous activity and solid achievement with increased numbers attending our regular meets. I am proud of the spirit prevailing in the club and if we can no longer afford to record our outstanding deeds regularly in the traditional journal I am hopeful we will be able to adopt other more economic means of keeping you up to date with our activities. I hope that readers will enjoy this journal, that they will be tolerant of the short-falls it contains, of which the Editor, I can assure you, is most conscious, and that in the future they will continue to enjoy reading of the doings of the YRC in their new form when they appear in 1986.

It gives me great pleasure to commend this Journal to your reading.