Strachey's period of work in Cambridge was relatively short. He joined the Mathematical Laboratory on a part-time basis in 1962 (see MS. Eng. misc. b. 253/A.62) and left to take up an appointment at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in September 1965 (see MS. Eng. misc. b. 253/A.66), subsequently moving to Oxford.

The period was nevertheless an important one in which he participated in major projects, notably CPL, and began work on several other ideas such as the Macrogenerator and formal semantics which were continued later and elsewhere.

The heading has therefore been adopted, partly for convenience but also because it represents a genuine chapter in Strachey's career.