Part I: Seals teeth and whales ears - Scott Polar Research Institute ...

included as part of my thesis, because it would have transgressed the length
limit! As my field work counted as only one year (three academic terms) and I
had done two terms in 1951, I had a minimum of four more terms of formal
residence to put in before I could submit my dissertation.
At that time Cath’s had only about ten PhD students. They included Donald
Parry and Norman Sheppard, Doug Wilkinson, Leo Wolfe, Frank Merrett (?),
[other names?] the first two later becoming FRS’s. We all got on well and I was
fortunate in joining my Brother Mike’s social circle, which included Colin
McLean who became Ambassador in Oslo, and Bob Heron, later Director of the
Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Scheme, among others. In addition there were a few
people whom I knew from before, so social life was quite good, when I could
drag myself away from my research. I still knew many people in Cambridge,
including the FIDS geologist Ray Adie now nearing the end of his PhD; we two
spent a lot of time together and regularly met up for morning coffee, at the “Bun
Shop” or “Copper Kettle” to compare notes. We often met up with Bunny Fuchs
when he came up from his London Office on Friday mornings to discuss our
progress with us.
Maureen arrives. Later in the summer Maureen, in Portugal, met some chaps out
from England to take part in or just to watch the Portuguese Grand Prix racing.
One of them, James Gourlay invited her to the Aviz Charity Ball, which was fun.
A few weeks later her parents drove to England and Maureen went in James's car
– a wooden-based body Triumph roadster, part of the way. When sailing
recently with Bill Thorburn (old friend) and others on his small yacht she pulled a
muscle and it ‘froze’, so riding in James' open roadster didn't improve the
shoulder. By the time they arrived in Angoulême, it was so stiff and painful that
she saw a doctor, who put it in plaster. It was very hot in Paris, but she did
manage to accompany her parents to the Eiffel Tower, Versailles and the Folies
Bergères, her father’s choice! I met them at the Selsdon Park Hotel, Sanderstead,
Surrey, and stayed the week-end. Poor Maureen was still in plaster. Then they all
came up to Cambridge, for a few days to be shown around. After her parents left
we often met in London for dinner and/or a theatre and then she came up to stay
in Cambridge.
She was 21 that year and had come over to the UK to get a job as an Air
Hostess, but although she sailed through the first interview with flying colours, it
didn't work the second time; she thought it was because she was too tall. So she
took a secretarial job in a small family fashion store in Cambridge, called
Heyworths (now long defunct), near the Arts Theatre. She was staying at a
boarding house in Cambridge, on the Lensfield road, run by Danuta Smaczny
(am Czech who was only about ten years older than she was) and Danuta's ex-
RAF husband who was Polish. Danuta had lost her family to the Germans in
Poland during the war and had been sent herself to work in Germany. She was
very sophisticated, yet charming and Maureen liked her very much. (She is still a
good friend forty years on, still living in Cambridge, and we see her from time to
time).
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