____       _     _                _    ____                   _             
| __ ) _ __(_) __| | __ _  ___  __| |  / ___|_ __ ___  ___ ___(_)_ __   __ _ 
|  _ \| '__| |/ _` |/ _` |/ _ \/ _` | | |   | '__/ _ \/ __/ __| | '_ \ / _` |
| |_) | |  | | (_| | (_| |  __/ (_| | | |___| | | (_) \__ \__ \ | | | | (_| |
|____/|_|  |_|\__,_|\__, |\___|\__,_|  \____|_|  \___/|___/___/_|_| |_|\__, |
                    |___/                                              |___/ 

It was the maturation of bulletin board services.  The Internet was perhaps 
five years on the horizon.  Software was being written for various operating 
systems, and Microsoft had not quite gotten their edge.  The Bridged 
Crossing was started as an exchange of thoughts and ideas, and surprisingly 
turned into a meeting place for the future's youth. BBSers were just 
starting to get the concept of anonymity, and users were discovering the joy 
of writing prose and poetry to share with others. 

The Bridged Crossing was sysoped by Erich Widemark, at the time a teenager 
living in Phoenix Arizona.  It was one of the few BBSes to offer the 
continuity of many different users sharing a common goal - writing for the 
joy of sharing, without the immaturity of one line messages (for the most 
part) saying nothing.  It was fun while it lasted, but eventually the 
software changed, and the operating systems changed.

The system was run on an Epson QX-10 computer, which was Epson's first attempt
at a personal computer.  It was a Z-80 based system, but with a 8080 board  
installedallowing it to run MS-DOS at the blistering speed of 2 mhz.  
It ran QBBS -- in the early days when QBBS would crash if a message base 
exceeded 32KB.  

Much of the Poetry in the poetry section of the website was posted on The Bridged 
Crossing.


-Erich Widemark, Sysop</p>