Energy-time spectrograms of low-energy electrons and protons have been obtained in the high-latitude region near magnetic local noon with the photoelectron spectrometer (PES) and low-energy electron experiment (LEE) on board the AE-C and AE-D satellites. Electrons with energies between 0 and 500 eV are measured with the PES instrument, and electrons and protons between 200 eV and 25 keV are detected with the LEE instrument. The AE-C satellite was launched with a 68¿ orbital inclination and acquired data as it skimmed through the dayside cusp region over a wide range of local times. These observations complement those obtained from the polar-orbiting AE-D satellite, which acquired data within a few hours of magnetic local noon over a wide range of latitudes. Fluxes of low-energy electrons with Maxwellian differential energy spectra are often observed in the region bounded by 1000 and 1400 MLT and 78¿ and 81¿ invariant latitude. Fluxes of low-energy electrons are also observed adjacent to this region which have markedly different energy spectra. The latter fluxes are characterized by higher energies, often exceeding the 500-eV limit of the PES detector, and by complex energy spectra, including 'inverted V variations.' The principal feature apparent from these observations is the distinctive softening of the energy spectra of low-energy electrons and protons above approximately 78¿ in the postnoon region. This softening occurs within 0.01¿ invariant latitude and is located near the boundary between the statistical location of 'region 1' field-aligned currents and cusp region field-aligned currents determined by Iijima and Potemra (1976b). We suggest that the electron fluxes above this boundary which are characterized by very soft energy spectra have gained unaccelerated access to the ionosphere via the cusp and that the electron fluxes below this boundary with slightly harder energy spectra are the carriers of the region 1 field-aligned currents flowing away from the high-latitude auroral region. The prenoon-postnoon asymmetry of low-energy particle characteristics reported here and in earlier studies by McDiarmid et al. (1975, 1976) is consistent with the distribution and flow directions of field-aligned currents in the cusp and auroral region. Fluxes of low-energy electrons with complex and variable energy spectra were observed at latitudes up to 86¿ in the prenoon region during quiet geomagnetic conditions. These electron fluxes were accompanied by a noticeable reduction in the proton flux, suggesting the presence of an electric field directed upward from the polar cap region which provides a potential of a few hundred volts.