Apple Users Groups -- Where are they?

One of the interesting items of talk over the years has been the Apple Users Groups and their relevance in today's computing world. For many years, I was a member of the largest users group of its time, Apple Pugetsound Program Library Exchange or A.P.P.L.E. for short. It was just one of thousands of groups in the US at the time.

But then the membership started to wane in about 1987 as did many other groups. But then where membership in our group waned, other groups popped up. One such group was the Willamette Apple Connection or WAC, Inc. as it became known. A small group in southern Oregon, it grew to about 30-40 members and stayed at that number for the duration of its life span.

What is interesting is that the group was successful in spanning the timeframe of the first Internet usage and the closing down of the Apple ][ series production in Cupertino. What spelled a death knell for most groups even before this time, did not spell the end of WAC, Inc. for almost a year and a half. But in time the end did come, primarily because no one wanted to take over the work of doing the newsletter for the group.

But even though they are long gone, the materials the group produced are still alive thanks to the materials being preserved by the owner of the group for more than ten years. Now they are available online for all to see at:

http://wac.callapple.org

It will be really interesting to go back 50 years past the time frame of the Apple ][ computers and look back at this material and be able to see what the inner workings of the groups were like.