The author reflects on the way that the Plowden Report is represented in the historical record. Simple narratives of education policy are inadequate to capture the Report's significance in a decade of cultural turmoil, and the professional contention that it generated. Historical accounts will vary according to the viewpoint of the historian, and we must have regard to oral as well as documentary evidence. Following the Plowden Report, subsequent researches in the primary classroom and changes in state education policy indicate its practical and symbolic importance, but the memories of teachers are sometimes more muted in their recall of its impact on their practice.