Part III: Antarctica and Academe - Scott Polar Research Institute

fringe interactions with the University, on 1 July l985 I became Master of St
Edmund's House, a small graduate College of Cambridge University. It changed its
name to St Edmund's "College" in l986, shortly after my appointment., and I will
refer to it here by this name. St Edmund's College is one of five Graduate Colleges
of the University of Cambridge. It was founded in 1896 by the fifteenth Duke of
Norfolk and Baron Anatole von Hugel. The College is dedicated to St Edmund of
Abingdon, Archbishop of Canterbury (1233-40) and was until l986 known as "St
Edmund's House". It is the only Oxbridge College with a Roman Catholic Chapel.
St Edmund's House became one of the new Graduate Colleges of the University in
l965. The Master and Fellows looked after its day to day running but ultimate
responsibility lay with an Association, which had among its members some of the
Fellows and several Catholic Bishops. After having the status of an 'Approved
Society' for ten years it achieved the more secure status of an 'Approved Foundation'
in the University in l975. Then, in l983, the relationship with the Catholic heirarchy
underwent a significant change, when the ownership and running of the college was
handed over completely to the Master and Fellows, who then constituted the new
Association (a limited company under the Companies Acts, l948 to l981). The only
member of the College who was required to be a catholic was the Dean who had to
be a priest in holy orders because of his responsibilities for the Chapel services.
The Master, Father John Coventry SJ, and the more forward-looking Fellows, a
majority of them catholics, wished to change the emphasis in the College towards
academic excellence, while maintaining the catholic tradition. The College intended
to seek full collegiate status in the foreseeable future, preferably at the time of its
centenary, l996, which would involve the granting of a Royal Charter. This would
have been difficult if not impossible under the previous arrangements. It was in
pursuit of these objectives that I was elected. However, at the time of the transfer of
responsibility from the former Association to the Master anf Fellows, there had been
a conflict in the Fellowship and doubts had been expressed about the maintenance of
the catholic tradition. Although I did not realise it , this conflict was to break out
again in the early years of my Mastership and put the fellowship, and above all
myself, under some strain.
The College began its life with four students, rising to an average of ten in the early
part of the twentieth century and then up to 40 by the mid-l960 s. The College had a
very low profile in the University and when I was a Cambridge student in the l940s
and l950s I probably didn't know that it existed! Until St Edmund's became a College
of the University in l965, students reading for Cambridge degrees had to be admitted
by other colleges. Since l965 St Edmund's has been able to admit its own
postgraduate students and, since l973, undergraduates in two categories - Mature,
namely over 25 (and now 21) years of age and Affiliated Students who are graduates
of other universities permitted to read for the Cambridge BA degree in two rather
than three years. Since l969 the College has admitted women as well as men. Like all
Cambridge Colleges St Edmund's admits students of all faiths and none, but it is the
only Oxbridge College with a Roman Catholic chapel. .The students represent some
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