the ecc was founded in 1970 with berlin, hortonville, new london, omro, ripon, waupaca, weyauwega and winneconne as the original members. in 1973, weyauwega left for the central wisconsin conference (cwc) and was replaced by former cwc member little chute the following year. in 1979, new london left to join the bay conference in exchange for former cwc member wautoma. in 1995, waupun joined for football only as wautoma transferred to the flyway conference for football. in 1999, hortonville, little chute and waupaca joined the newly formed valley 8 conference, while waupun became a full-time member. that year, laconia and markesan also joined the conference. in 2001, the ecc merged with the flyway conference. the conference was briefing named the east central-flyway conference and consisted of two divisions: the rivers and the lakes. the conference was restructured again in 2006 as the flyway conference split with the ecc. the conference was fully disbanded in 2007 with four of the remaining ecc teams joining former valley 8 conference teams to form the eastern valley conference.