Though there had been a wee thing called an Acorn and a M.O.A.C. (see elsewhere in the collection) the first large scale, commercially produced gear for rock climbing protection replicated the hexagonal shape of a nut (as in nuts and bolts) so that ‘nuts’ became the generic term for all rock climbing protection. The UK companies of Clog and Troll were first on the scene in the 1960’s whilst over in America,Yvon Chouinard, was starting to produce his own version soon after. Ever inventive, Chouinard, altered the hexagonal shape of his early versions and in 1971 the hexentric was born: it was much more versatile than the hexagon and is still very popular – worldwide- 50 years later. We are not quite sure how it fits into the equation, but a Swedish climber, Tomas Carlstrom, created a thing called the ‘polycentric’ in 1972/3 which became part of Chouinard’s hexentric. Chouinard’s hexentrics were first produced in the USA and it is one of these early US sets that we have here in the collection. Later versions were produced by a company called C.A.M.P. in Italy; a large engineering company which makes its own gear and other stuff on licence. As a result of a legal case against Chouinard Equipment Ltd. It filed for bankruptcy in 1989 and re-emerged later as Black Diamond.