In July 1988, when I reported on how the Society came to be, the question was whether the broad community would respond. At that point we were organized but were just beginning to receive membership applications. We estimated that we needed between 500 and 1,000 members by the end of the year to survive, hoping to be closer to the larger number. In fact, by the end of October 1988, we had over 1700 members and were adding new members at the rate of about fifty per week. At this rate we could have as many as 2,000 members by the end of the year.

Baker, D.J. 1988. Society soundings: The Society gets off to a good start. Oceanography 1(2):50–51, https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.1988.17.

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