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Our story
Our story started in the 1940s when a group of Cambridge parents formed an action group to address the lack of community care for people with learning disabilities and their families in the local area. They also set up a social club that organised outings and sports activities - and in 1947, registered Cambridge Mencap as an independent charity.
Early in the 1960s they purchased Edmund house a Victorian house at Milton, which was renovated and adapted for use as a residential care home - the first of its kind in the independent sector at the time. After 20 years of use, the house was replaced by a number of smaller, purpose-built care homes at the end of the 1980s.
Over the past 9 years, Cambridge Mencap has also developed a range of community services - including a family support service, befriending schemes and volunteering opportunities through our gardening and Fare Shares Café project.
At the end of 2008, Cambridge, Fenland, Peterborough and St Ives Mencap merged to form a new charity, Cambridgeshire Mencap, with the capacity to help more people across the county and increase the range of services offered. Pooling resources should also ensure that they are used more equitably and that no one will 'lose out' just because they live in a more remote part of Cambridgeshire.
At the start of this new chapter in our story, our aim remains what it was over 60 years ago - to empower and support people with leaning disabilities to live life their own way.
