More about the podcasts

Series Editor: Chris Garrington
Series Director: Paul Thompson

• Podcast 1: Introduction

  An introduction from Paul Thompson

  This introductory podcast features an interview with the man behind the podcast project, Paul Thompson. A Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, Paul Thompson talks of Essex as “one of the places where oral history in Britain originated”.

  When he moved to Wivenhoe in the 1990s, Professor Thompson initiated an oral history project based in the town, which grew to involve many enthusiastic local residents. There are now over 60 interviews with Wivenhoe residents in the archive, many of whom worked at the University. The oral history archive is held at the Colchester Museum Resources Centre, as well as at our Albert Sloman Library.

  The interview was carried out by Chris Garrington, herself a former University employee, who edited together this series of podcasts based on the archive interviews.

• Podcast 2: Sir Albert Sloman’s vision

  Sir Albert Sloman’s vision

  This podcast examines founding Vice-Chancellor Sir Albert Sloman’s vision for the University and how others saw it at the time.

  “A new university enjoys the immense advantage of a clean slate; unhampered
  by precedents and by established structures, its plans can be freer, more daring, more experimental.”
  

  Sir Albert Sloman, 1963 Reith Lectures

  Sir Albert Sloman saw a university which would be interdisciplinary, where subjects would inter-relate, often with an international focus that looked beyond the West, and be taught by leaders in their fields. Class and social barriers would be broken down by attracting not just some of the best and brightest students from around the world, but also many of the older men and women in the area who had never had the chance to go into higher education.

  Some of the early staff attracted by Sir Albert’s vision talk about the “bright, imaginative, adventurous” undergraduates who might otherwise have gone to Oxford and Cambridge – and academics who were upset at the idea of not having a Senior Common Room where they could escape from the students.

  Interviewees

  • Dawn Ades, Professor of Art History
  • Martin Atkinson, Emeritus Professor of Language and Linguistics, first came to Essex in 1974
  • Joanna Bornat, PhD student, now Emeritus Professor, Faculty of Health and Social Care, Open University
  • Peter Frank, former Professor of Russian Politics in the Department of Government
  • Maurice Kimmit, former Professor of Physics, now Visiting Professor at the University’s Physics Centre
  • Anthony King, appointed Senior Lecturer in Government in 1966, now Essex County Council Millennium Professor of British Government
  • Alastair McAuley, Reader in the Department of Economics
  • Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studiesfor over 30 years
  • Paul Thompson, Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, first came to Essex in 1964
  • Peter Townsend (died 2009), founding Professor of Sociology

  
  

• Podcast 3: Sir Albert Sloman – the man

  Sir Albert Sloman – the man

  The third of our 50th Anniversary podcasts considers founding Vice-Chancellor Sir Albert Sloman, with some of those who worked with him discussing his “formidable skill” and “excellent eye for people of exceptional ability” – as well as his shyness.

  “Was he a good Vice-Chancellor? Yes, he created – from scratch – a great university.”

  Sir Denis Forman, former executive in the British film and television industry and honorary graduate of the University of Essex

  Sir Albert Sloman was a former wartime RAF fighter pilot who became the founding and longest serving Vice-Chancellor of the University of Essex. The interviewees in this podcast tell of a man who was “scrupulously fair-minded” and “insisted on hiring the best”.

  Sir Albert Sloman died in July 2012. You can read former Vice-Chancellor Professor Sir Ivor Crewe’s assessment of his life and work on our website.

  Interviewees

  • Sheila Cardy, former Secretary to the Registrar
  • Sir Ivor Crewe, Vice-Chancellor, 1995-2007, and Lecturer and Professor in Government at Essex for more than 35 years
  • Robin Dixon, former Secretary to the School of Comparative Studies
  • Sir Denis Forman, former executive in the British film and television industry and honorary graduate of the University of Essex
  • Anthony King, appointed Senior Lecturer in Government in 1966, now Essex County Council Millennium Professor of British Government
  • Margaret Law, former Secretary to the Vice-Chancellor
  • Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies for over 30 years
  • Peter Townsend (died 2009), founding Professor of Sociology

  
  

• Podcast 4: Essex architecture

  The first Vice-Chancellor and the campus architect Kenneth Capon were appointed on the same day in October 1962.

  In this, the fourth in our Creating a University series of podcasts, staff and students from the early days talk about the vision these two men had for 'a harmonious composition of towers and terraces floating in the lap of its wooded valley'. They reminisce, too, about life at the University of Essex before the buildings went up – with lectures in Nissen huts and departments based in the old stable blocks at Wivenhoe House.

  “A space-age cultural city in the sky with a Manhattan Island silhouette”

  East Essex Gazette, 25 October 1963

  Interviewees

  • Dawn Ades, Professor of Art History
  • Sir John Ashworth, founding Professor of Biological Sciences
  • Peter Haine, Physics student, 1964-67
  • Jules Lubbock, Visiting Professor in the Department of Art History
  • Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies for over 30 years
  • James Sutherland, structural engineer and designer
  • Peter Townsend (died 2009), founding Professor of Sociology
  • Margery Wilson, Literature student, 1971-74

  
  

• Podcast 5: Studying at Essex

  It was, they say now, “something different”, “very exciting” and even “probably the most positive experience of my life”. In the fifth of our 50th Anniversary podcasts, students who came to the new University of Essex in the 1960s and 70s talk about their memories of campus, classes, teachers and tiddlywinks.

  “Our first students will still be in positions of influence and responsibility in the first two decades of the twenty-first century.”

  Sir Albert Sloman, 1963 Reith Lectures

  It was a place of political awakenings, and one where barriers were broken down – where a politics lecturer could play football with his students. But it was also intellectually challenging, a place where your views were listened to and an opportunity to make lifelong friends and, in some cases, partners.

  Interviewees

  • Peter Avis, Maths student 1964-67
  • John Dowden, Maths PhD student, 1963-67, the University’s first student and now Emeritus Professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences
  • Peter Haine, Physics student, 1964-67
  • Nicolette Hardee, Literature student, 1966-69
  • Christine Hinton, Sociology student, 1967-70
  • Margery Wilson, Literature student, 1971-74
  • Peter Wyatt, Government student, 1966-69

  
  

• Podcast 6: Socialising at Essex

  The sixth Creating a University podcast covers subjects as diverse as The Who, dandelions in cricket nets, uncooperative cockerels and weight training equipment made from scaffolding poles, paint tins and concrete. All played a part in the free time students and staff enjoyed in the early days at Essex.

  “A university should, I believe, provide an experience of living as well as an opportunity for learning.”

  Sir Albert Sloman, 1963 Reith Lectures

  A tradition of theatre at Essex began with little or no facilities, and a bout of chickenpox was not enough to derail the inaugural production of ‘An Inspector Calls’. Entertainments went on to include a madrigal group’s appearance at evensong at Long Melford parish church, an early appearance by Bob Marley and a concert in the Hexagon by Pink Floyd, described by one student who was there as “one of the most magical experiences of my life”.

  Interviewees

  • Peter Avis, Maths student 1964-67
  • John Foster, former member of staff and local resident
  • Peter Haine, Physics student, 1964-67
  • Alan Rustage, first Director of Sport, appointed in 1974
  • Roger Seymour, Chemistry student, 1964-67
  • Margery Wilson, Literature student, 1971-74

  
  

• Podcast 7: “A lovely place to work”

  People who worked at the University at its inception have tales to tell about tea breaks, beer in the bar at lunchtime and even ping pong in the office. The University was, one says, “almost like a holiday camp” – although by the time he left, lunch was a sandwich in one hand and a pen in the other. When it came to dealing with students, some were “lovely”, while dealing with others required patience, tolerance or unbreakable glass.

  “There is a wonderful spirit abroad in Essex and I am impressed with the air of impatience... to get on with the job... Success is set in your hands.”

  Col. Sir John Ruggles-Brise, Lord Lieutenant of Essex, Chairman of the Council of Governors

  For other staff, memorable incidents included the Vice-Chancellor’s wife bringing tea and biscuits on a silver platter – or Graduation, with the chance to encounter MPs and others one would never have the chance to meet. “It’s surprising,” we hear, “what people say to you when it’s just the two of you in a lift.”

  Interviewees

  • John Cox, formerly of Estate Management
  • Robin Dixon, former Secretary to the School of Comparative Studies
  • Mary Girling, former Secretary, Department of Sociology
  • Margaret Lynch, formerly of Estate Management
  • David Morgan, formerly of Estate Management
  • Alex Selley, formerly of Estate Management

  
  

• Podcast 8: Creating a university

  The academic experience

  What was it like to teach at an entirely new university, and to have greater freedom than at more established institutions? In this podcast – the eighth in our series – early academics say the atmosphere was "exhilarating", "intellectually exciting" and "relaxed". A job offer from Essex was "a huge opportunity – I just had to take it".

  "We shall do everything in our power to remove routine administrative work from academic staff so as to leave them time for teaching and research, time also for really strategic thinking on policy."

  Sir Albert Sloman, 1963 Reith Lectures

  Essex was established to be interdisciplinary, and early academics found the opportunity to talk to colleagues over lunch or coffee created enormous "intellectual traffic between departments". There was an openness to new ideas that would not have been possible at a more conventional university. There was even, at the beginning, the opportunity to be offered a job with no formal interview.

  Interviewees

  • Dawn Ades, Professor of Art History
  • Ted Benton, Professor of Sociology
  • Peter Frank, former Professor of Russian Politics in the Department of Government
  • Peter Townsend, founding Professor of Sociology
  • Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies for over 30 years
  • Paul Thompson, Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, first came to Essex in 1964

  
  

• Podcast 9: At the cutting edge

  Three of the University’s most influential early academics talk about the impact of their work – in computer science, sociology and science.

  "A primary function of a university must be to engage in research. It can discharge its responsibility to train future researchers only if it is itself a place where research is done. And research is the guarantee of its academic standards ... One good scientist attracts another. They attract good students too."

  Sir Albert Sloman, 1963 Reith Lectures

  Interviewees

  Tony Brooker

  Tony Brooker was the founding Professor of Computer Science, and credited with creating the world’s first publicly available computer language. He talks of the days when there were no computer terminals, and students had to use punch cards which "invariably had mistakes" at first and would "produce garbage" as a result. Later, he says, Essex scored a coup in getting the PDP-10, the first time-sharing computer in the country.

  Dennis Marsden

  Dennis Marsden was an early sociologist, and co-author of Education and the Working Class, described by the Times Higher Education in its obituary of Marsden as "the single most influential book in its field in the 1960s and early 1970s" (and, by the Guardian, as a key source for Alan Bennett’s play The History Boys). He went on to produce pioneering studies of fatherless families and the unemployed, and talks here of how he "got very good at talking my way off doorsteps, indoors".

  Sir John Ashworth

  Sir John Ashworth was founding Professor of Biological Sciences and went on to become the government’s Chief Scientific Officer. Baroness Blackstone apparently thought he was "absolutely nuts" when he told James Callaghan’s Cabinet that micro-chips would "revolutionise everything". He speaks of how a conversation in a becalmed boat off Clacton led him to that Cabinet meeting, and how "it’s all come about, even more radically and more quickly than I had anticipated".

• Podcast 10: Troubles

  The telegram of support from Jean-Paul Sartre has long since been lost, but many still remember the student uprisings of the late 1960s and early 70s, and “the experience of seeing how a social authority could crumble in the face of opposition and resistance”.

  “There were barricades under the podia, and I had to attend some rather rocky Senate meetings!”

  Mark Tatham, Emeritus Professor, Department of Language and Linguistics

  Interviewees

  • Sir John Ashworth, founding Professor of Biological Sciences
  • Marie Evers, formerly of Estate Management
  • Christine Hinton, Sociology student, 1967-70
  • David Morgan, formerly of Estate Management
  • Gabriel Pearson, Professor in the Department of Literature, Film and Theatre Studies for over 30 years
  • Alex Selley, formerly of Estate Management
  • Paul Thompson, Research Professor in the Department of Sociology, first came to Essex in 1964
  • Peter Townsend, founding Professor of Sociology (died 2009)

  
  

• Podcast 11: Town and gown

  In 1961, the Essex County Standard said that “sales of cigarettes and confectionery will boom ... each student will spend an average of £7 10s a week on his keep and amusements.” [Essex County Standard, 26 May 1961]. In the last of our podcasts marking the 50th Anniversary of the University, residents of Wivenhoe and Colchester remember how it felt to have a new university arrive in their midst.

  “The decision to fund a University in Colchester is the most important thing since the Emperor Claudius built his temple.”

  Mark Tatham, Emeritus Professor, Department of Language and Linguistics

  The interviewees talk about the role of the local community in supporting the development of the University and initial anticipation at the arrival of students. Local residents recall ‘weird characters’ dressed in ‘pink satin breeches’, how the local primary school welcomed new pupils from all over the world, and how sport was uses to help progress town and gown relations.

  Interviewees

  • Jack Tinson
  • Freda Anis
  • Joyce Blackwood
  • Moira and David Hart. David Hart OBE was involved in the University from the very beginning, a former Pro-Chancellor, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the University. He died in December 2012. David's obituary.
  • Hilda Tabor
  • Alex Selley, formerly of Estate Management
  • Alan Rustage, former Director of Sport