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The ITT is looking to hear from current and former members who have memorabilia relating to the institute’s early days.
The call comes as the institute gears up to celebrate its 60th anniversary. It particularly wants to locate material or stories about the ITT in its first few years of activity, after being formed in 1956.
ITT chairman Steven Freudmann said: “We will be celebrating our diamond anniversary in 2016 and we plan to celebrate this milestone of 60 years in a number of ways leading up to the diamond jubilee party at The Dorchester on October 19.
“We are putting out a call to all current and former ITT members for any memorabilia, photos and stories – so it could be old conference programmes or anything else that people have hung on to over the years.”
Freudmann added that he was particularly keen to find material dating back to before 1969.
“We want to learn a little more about our history before 1969 when I joined the institute, as our records are not so good before then,” he said.
“We want to hear any interesting stories from former board members and presidents. There must be hundreds – if not thousands – of former members when you consider that we currently have 2,000 members.”
Freudmann said they had already found typed and hand-written membership records for some of the biggest names in the travel industry over the past few decades.
These include aviation greats such as Sir Freddie Laker and British Airways’ Lord King and Lord Marshall, as well as fellow industry legends Harry Goodman, Billy Butlin and Fred Pontin.
“All were members of the ITT in years gone by,” he added. “We would like to pull together some memorabilia, stories and facts from those years, which we hope to use in some way at a number of events this year – not least our conference in June.
“How we display the material depends on what turns up but we will certainly do something online as well.”
Meanwhile, Audley Travel chairman Richard Prosser will be the guest speaker at the next ITT Odyssey dinner on February 4 at the House of Commons.
The operator recently secured a £159 million investment from private equity company 3i.
Current and former members who have historic ITT material or stories to tell can contact 08444 995653 or email Paul Evans at paul@itt.co.uk.
