Queen Elizabeth (Kensington) Branch of
King's College, London Alumni Association

Chair: Ann Wood (1970-75)

The 'Committee': John Brockhouse (1974-78), Helen Huckvale (nee Parsons) (1975-78), Audrey Stubbs, Henry Embling (1972-78), Lyn Embling (1972-78), Gary Thomas (1974-77), Mick Farrow (1975-78), Jean Atkins (1946-49), Mike Barker (1974-77), Pat Cox (1951-54), Hilary Phillips (nee Skirrow) (1961-64)

July 2004

Dear Colleague,

Reunion 2003

Last year's QEC Association reunion was held in the Franklin Wilkins Building at the Waterloo campus of KCL.  It was extremely successful, with about 80 members attending, enjoying each other's company, viewing photos from student days and listening to Professor Howard Dalton FRS who spoke to us of his time at QEC (1961-64, Microbiology) and his life in Microbiology Research since then.

Reunion 2004

I am now writing to invite you to the next Reunion planned for October 16th in the QEC and Chelsea Colleges Room of the Franklin Wilkins building.  Our guest speaker will be Professor Barry Keverne FRS (Zoology 1964).  He is now Head of the Behavioural Neurosciences Unit at Cambridge University and he will be talking to us about how life in research and academia has changed over the years.

The Franklin Wilkins Building is only 5 minutes walk from Waterloo and Waterloo East stations. It is also very close to the London Eye, County Hall, National Theatre, National Film Theatre, Royal Festival Hall and Hayward Gallery on the South Bank of the Thames. A 15 minute walk will take you to the Tate Modern and Millennium Bridge.  We are amply supplied with pubs, wine bars, cafes and restaurants within walking distance for you to carry on your reunion after leaving us in the late afternoon. If you prefer, a short bus, tube or taxi ride will take you to Covent Garden and the West End, so you can make the most of the shops and entertainment there.

We are hoping that as many former QEC staff and students as possible can attend to help make it another year to remember.  If you have not been to the Reunion before, you'll find that there are usually people that you knew by sight, if not by name, from your time at college. The friendly atmosphere, characteristic of the old QEC, is conducive to mixing, even if you come on your own, but if you can co-ordinate with some of your old friends to make up a party so much the better.  We are particularly keen to invite those who graduated 50 years ago in 1954.  Pat Cox is organising her former classmates but if you have not been contacted yet, do please get in touch so we can include you in the festivities.  We are also hoping that those of you who graduated, 20, 25, 30 and 40 years ago, in 1984, 1979, 1974 and 1964 will take this opportunity to meet up with old classmates.

Last year we had lots of photos dating back many decades which were a treasure of social and academic history.  Many of these were kindly loaned to us so they could be scanned and archived as well as being published in the next Envoy.  We are now asking you to search your old albums to see if you have any photos which include the college buildings/rooms/labs etc.  We are keen to scan these (on the day of the reunion so you don't have to give them up!) and add to the archive, and also to put on our website (www.qeca.org.uk).  Many of you may not know that the old QEC building has been redeveloped as high class residential accommodation, while the Atkins building has been demolished and the land, together with land obtained from the neighbouring school (Holland Park Comprehensive) is also being developed for residential purposes.   As those buildings have effectively been 'lost' to the public we are keen to build a photographic record of the old locations.

Further details of the day appear on a separate page. Please return your reply to Henry Embling  by 30th September so that catering numbers can be established.

News of former QEC departments

Many of you may have heard  that KCL decided to close down its Chemistry degrees last year, so that the current students finishing year 2 will be the final graduates.  You may recall some of the QEC chemists such as Fred Armitage and Martin Hughes, who are still teaching here in Chemistry.  I am delighted to be able to tell you that Professor Hughes has agreed to be our guest speaker in October 2005 and he will no doubt be a fund of stories going back over 40 years teaching in this institution.

This year KCL also decided to close down its degree programmes in Biological Sciences (incorporating the old single honours programmes in Biology, Botany and Zoology) as well as Microbiology.  Our current students just completing year 1 will be the final graduates in these subjects.  Other degree programmes such as Biochemistry, Nutrition and Dietetics are still recruiting well, and based here at the Waterloo campus.

Envoy 2004

Last year's reintroduction of Envoy was extremely popular and again we extend our thanks to Lyn Embling (nee Rigby) (1972-78) for putting it together and to the numerous contributors.  This message should come to you with the latest edition of Envoy which is your QEC-specific newsletter.

We plan to continue to produce Envoy annually as long as we continue to receive suitable material, so please send in news about yourselves or colleagues. Please write to Lyn Embling with any reminiscences, anecdotes or general interest articles for inclusion in Envoy 2005 or if you prefer, send them to Gary Thomas for inclusion in our website instead (see below).

Committee

Our aim is to operate the Association as informally as possible, but there is a core group of people who steadfastly turn up to the Committee meetings we hold every 3 months.  I want to acknowledge the assistance of the people named above who are currently involved with running the organisation and I am especially grateful to them for welcoming me to the position of Chairman and gently easing me into the job. Please feel free to contact any of us to make your points of view known at our meetings.  All contact details are on our web site.

Website

Gary Thomas has continued to run our web site www.qeca.org.uk which has been growing steadily as has its number of monthly 'hits' - so we know many of you are logging in to take a look.  Do let him know what you think or include suggestions for possible improvements.

You may also be aware that former colleagues from QEC, school and work can be found at www.friendsreunited.com . Why not register there as well - I have managed to meet up with pals from Junior School (last seen 40 years ago!) as well as pals from QEC, so it's well worth a try if you want to revisit your youth or just wallow in a bit of nostalgia.

Contact details

Almost everyone will know at least one friend or colleague that did not join or has lost contact with the Association. If you could pass on our details (e-mail addresses, website) to someone that you know who might be interested in the Association's activities we could increase the number that get to hear of events and Reunions to the benefit of all.

Maintaining up-to-date contact details helps keep our costs down so please spare the time to fill-in and return the separate sheet for changes to personal details and preferences - it doesn't take very long to reply. Many of you will use email so, if you would like to receive future information via this medium, please let us know. This, of course, also avoids wasted paper but don't forget to keep us informed of any changes. We will use contact details you conveyed to us last year unless otherwise informed.

I do hope that you will stay in touch with the organisation and hope to see you at the Reunion in October.

Yours sincerely

Ann Wood

This page created 06 September 2004