University College Oxford Record 2020

quiet sense of humour and more importantly, a
sense of the ridiculous.
David died peacefully at home on 16th August
2019, in the company of his loving family. He will
be greatly missed.
THOMAS DAVID NEVILLE
(Wrekin College) died on 4 April 2020 aged
86. On going down from Oxford, David Neville
worked as an insurance broker, first for T. D.
Neville, Ltd., and then for John Ansell
& Partners Ltd. We are most grateful
to Professor Adrian Zuckerman (F.
1973-2010) for providing this tribute:
David’s time at Univ was the
happiest of his youth. For the rest of
his life, his memories of this period
provided him with a rich source of
anecdotes and mirth. He was born on
21 February 1934. From school he went
to do his national service and was en route for
Korea when the war ended. His regiment stopped
in Hong Kong where he dutifully represented it
on the cricket field. Cricket continued to occupy
his energies and mind at Univ too, where he read
Geography. Even so, he found time to hone his
playfulness with words and developed musical
interests, singing for the Bach Choir.
At heart, David was a sportsman of the old
school. He played for the Harlequins and for
Staffordshire county cricket, was a fine skier,
as well as a keen rugby and hockey player. He
was of the Kipling school of thinking about
achievements. His values were very traditional
and always underlined by kindness, humour and
a joie de vivre. He had inexhaustible resources
of love, affection and interest in others. Love for
his family above all. He cared greatly about his
friends and easily made new ones (he would
return from Sainsbury’s having made five new
friends). Notwithstanding his attachment to
traditional English values, he was exceptionally
gentle, tolerant and very patient (unless he was
on the phone to a call centre!). I knew David for
the last twenty years of his life. To the end he
would show a sunny and welcoming disposition
of deep kindness which warmed the heart and
lifted the spirits of all who came into contact
with him.
1958:
COLIN DOUGLAS BRIGHT
(Eton) died on 3 May 2019 aged 78.
He read Maths at Univ. A brief note
appeared in last year’s Record, but
his widow Imogen has now kindly
provided this tribute:
Colin liked to claim that the only
reason he got into Univ was on
account of his great-great-uncle Franck
Bright, Master in 1881-1906, and how at his
interview the dons just pointed to the portrait
and that was all.
Colin like many others was good friends with
Gwynne Ovenstone. When he got engaged to
Imogen O’Brien, Gwynne wrote to her father
that she was delighted to see that his daughter
had “got engaged to such an upstanding Univ old
member...” Imogen used to boast that her ancestor
too was an old Univ member: John Potter
(1674-1747) was the only Univ undergraduate
appointed Archbishop of Canterbury.
Colin always called himself a mathematician,
and continued his studies until his last months.
There was no maths don at Univ in his time, so he
had to go to Balliol, to be taught by Jack de Wet.
During a year out in Paris he attended stimulating
lectures at the Sorbonne. He also taught English
74 University College Record | October 2020