Above is our lodging for two nights, old dorm rooms on the quad of Keble College, turned into lodging for visitors. We took our breakfasts in the college dining hall (below), which would give any 5-star restaurant a run for it's money. Keble College is one of the 38 colleges that comprise the University of Oxford.
From Wikipedia: The University of Oxford (informally Oxford University or simply Oxford) is a collegiate research university located in Oxford, England. While having no known date of foundation, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world, and the world's second-oldest surviving university. It grew rapidly from 1167 when Henry II banned English students from attending the University of Paris. After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk in 1209, some academics fled northeast to Cambridge, where they established what became the University of Cambridge. The two "ancient universities" are frequently jointly referred to as "Oxbridge".
The University is made up from a variety of institutions, including 38 constituent colleges and a full range of academic departments which are organised into four Divisions. All the colleges are self-governing institutions as part of the University, each controlling its own membership and with its own internal structure and activities. Being a city university, it does not have a main campus; instead, all the buildings and facilities are scattered throughout the metropolitan centre.
And it wouldn't be a typical trip for us if we didn't meet up with a chess friend that I had met playing on my chess website. We didn't have a lot of time to spend in England proper this trip, so Dave was gracious enough to drive over to Oxford to meet us. He stayed at Keble College also, so we were able to spend a full day with him in addition to dinner that first evening. Thanks for a great time, Dave!
A small room on the side of the college chapel houses this famous painting, 'The Light of the World' by Holman Hunt. In a room with only ambient light, the painting appears dark and unintelligible... but when a light is placed close, and directed on the painting... well, you see the effect below. It's almost as if the figure is telling us to use a light.
We appreciated the kids appreciating the dinosaurs. It was a great museum, just across from our lodging, much of it hands-on and interactive, some displays even imploring you to touch. There were numerous groups of kids obviously on school field days. A world of dinosaurs... their fantasies and daydreams realized!
I guess it's not surprising that so many great minds converged here over the centuries, it being the oldest English speaking University in the world. From the text in the pic below: Alice Liddel's father was Dean of Christ Church where Charles Lutwidge Dodgson was a lecturer, and had been a keen supporter of the project to build the University Museum. Dodgson brought Alice and her sisters here on rainy afternoons and so incorporated into the wonderful stories he created for them many of the creatures of the displays, including the famous Oxford Dodo, a favourite for Dodgson who had a stammer: Do-do-dodgson.
Dodgson was persuaded to write down his stories. The result, published in 1865 under the name Lewis Carroll, and wonderfully illustrated by John Tenniel, became the world favourite 'Alice in Wonderland'
The dodo is the most famous of all the creatures to have become extinct in historical times. The remains of the dodo at Oxford are one of the greatest treasures of the Museum.
The 1860 Oxford evolution debate took place at the Oxford University Museum in Oxford, England, on 30 June 1860, seven months after the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. Several prominent British scientists and philosophers participated, including Thomas Henry Huxley, Bishop Samuel Wilberforce, Benjamin Brodie, Joseph Dalton Hooker and Robert FitzRoy. The debate is best remembered today for a heated exchange in which Wilberforce supposedly asked Huxley whether it was through his grandfather or his grandmother that he claimed his descent from a monkey. Huxley is said to have replied that he would not be ashamed to have a monkey for his ancestor, but he would be ashamed to be connected with a man who used his great gifts to obscure the truth.
And this about Marconi and his early attempts at wireless transatlantic communication: In 1901, Marconi built a station near South Wellfleet, Massachusetts that on 18 January 1903 sent a message of greetings from Theodore Roosevelt, the President of the United States, to King Edward VII of the United Kingdom, marking the first transatlantic radio transmission originating in the United States. This station also was one of the first to receive the distress signals coming from the RMS Titanic.
The transatlantic cable, the original hard-wired version of transatlantic communication enters the US at Marconi Beach, just a mile down the beach from our cottage there. This was the first fast, reliable, and direct communication line to Europe. Of no little significance, what?! Reonnecting us with our roots, you might say.
We had dinner our last night in Oxford at 'The Eagle and Child' pub, which was a favorite watering hole for C.S. Lewis (Lewis Carroll) and J. R. R. Tolkien. These two famous authors, and others, a loose-knit group of writers calling themselves 'The Inklings' met at The Eagle and Child in the 1930's and 40's to discuss literature, specifically the genre of fantasy.
The origin of this pub name can be traced to the fourteenth century. Sir Thomas Latham, who lived near to Lytham St Annes in Lancashire, had one legitimate child, Isabel. His wife failed to fall pregnant with his desired son and heir and, as so often the case with the great families of England, the maid soon fell pregnant instead with the healthy son her master wanted.
Desperate for a son to succeed him, Sir Thomas devised a plan to persuade his wife to adopt the boy as her own, legitimizing him in the process. He arranged for the child to be left at the base of a tree where he had recently observed eagles nesting. His plan was to claim the baby had been abandoned by the birds, a story that his wife apparently accepted, adopting the boy soon afterwards. But after Sir Thomas died it was his daughter, Isabel, who inherited the estate.
Locals were said to have commemorated this story of man’s inability to really fool his wife by naming a local tavern the Eagle and Child, and several other establishments were similarly named in successive years across the country. The most famous inn by this name is in St Giles, Oxford, once the Royalist capital during the English Civil War (1641–51). It is claimed that the Chancellor of the Exchequer lodged there during the conflict and the building served as the paymaster’s quarters for the Royalist army, their horses being fed and watered in the courtyard.
The pub also has strong literary connections: C. S. Lewis (author of The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe and the rest of the Narnia books) and J. R. R. Tolkien (The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, both featuring child-sized hobbits being rescued by giant eagles) met at the Eagle and Child every Friday between 1939 and 1962 for drinks and conversation.
These days the pub is affectionately known by those wacky university students – destined to be running the nation’s judiciary, industry and even government, God help us all – as the Bird and Bastard, the Bustard and Bastard, the Fowl and Foetus and, most ridiculous of all, the Bird and Brat.
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