The Second Thoughts Web Site started life in August 1996, as an experiment to see what the new-fangled World Wide Web could do for a small town drama group based in England. 

To put this in context, Netscape, the first really accessible web browser, was only launched commercially in 1994 and Internet Explorer 4 arrived as an integral part of Microsoft Windows in 1997.

At the time, most members of Second Thoughts didn’t have internet access and couldn’t see what was being displayed to the whole world in their name.

Developing and maintaining the site was hard work, as all the pages had to be assembled by hand using HTML.  The software to make page layout easy didn’t become reliable enough for us till around 2001.

The site was always intended to publicise our productions and increasingly served to attract enquiries from potential new members.  At times we’ve tried to incorporate other things, like related local news and even the group’s internal politics, but in the end aiming it at the audience and new members seemed to work best.

All the same, it would be nice to think that the web site contributes to the feeling of pride that existing members have in their drama group.

We didn’t keep back issues of the site, as at the time it didn’t seem like an interesting thing to preserve. Fortunately, someone was doing it for us. Below are links to copies of some pages captured by The WayBackMachine.

March 1997 Home Page - we already have a banner-and-sidebar layout, but only on the home page. The next production is advertised, but more prominence is given to the campaign to save the Waterside Theatre. Spot the take-off of a Microsoft advertising slogan.

March 1997 Productions Page - nothing if not modest, we let you decide if we’re any good or not.

March 1997 Season - an impartial review of The Silver King and advert for Measure for Measure.

March 1998 Amateur Theatre Glossary - a bit of humour, allegedly, inspired by The Bluffers Guide to the Theatre.

March 1998 Election - results of the AGM election for Chairman and other motions passed. Note the reference to The Alternative ST Web Site, briefly hosted by noted dissident Steve Farr. This actually got us some publicity on the About Amateur Theatre web site (now defunct), as an example of how quirky and interesting we were.

March 1998 Reviews - some more reviews by local newspapers.

March 1998 Waterside - victory in the campaign to save the Waterside Theatre, we thought. It turned out to be somewhat hollow.  The district council never followed through on the plan to create an arts centre. The site now houses the Shakespearience attraction.