College Record 2013

Pawdle across the chumba
John Penney (GS 1971–72, MCR 1972–73, GBF 1973–
2012, EF 2012– ) spoke at this year’s Iffley Dinner which
celebrates the origins of Wolfson.
Iffley is the name of a rather charming village, now a southern suburb of Oxford,
set beside the Thames and reachable by a pleasant walk following the towpath
downstream from the far side of Folly Bridge. There is a wonderfully ornate
Norman church, its doors and windows covered with zig-zag decoration on the
mouldings, and one of these arches figures in the College coat of arms: above the
normal shield (which you can see on the plates), the full coat of arms has a helmet
with a crest surmounted by symbols, one of which is an Iffley arch.
When I first joined the College, the coat of arms was still under discussion and
I remember the disappointment (in some quarters) that greeted the news that
the Royal College of Heralds had vetoed the inclusion of a representation of two
chromosomes crossed in meiosis – that would certainly have been a heraldic first.
It was in a house in Iffley that the University established in 1965 a new college,
Iffley College, chiefly to make provision for some of the many people who held
University posts but had no college attachment. The 36 Fellows were determined
to create a proper college, not just a dining club for senior members, and they had
the inspired idea of inviting Isaiah Berlin to be the first President: Isaiah accepted
on condition that he was able to raise sufficient funds to build and endow a college
(the building at Iffley was far too small), and this he achieved with remarkable speed,
so that in October 1966, duly established by University Statute, Wolfson College
was born out of Iffley College, rather like Athena from the head of Zeus. So Iffley
College was in one sense short-lived; but the ideals of the Iffley Fellows persist and
still inform all aspects of College life today, which is why it is appropriate to keep
their memory bright.
In the early days of the College, Isaiah Berlin used to say: ‘Of course, it’s not a real
college yet: there is not enough bad feeling between the Fellows.’
We have been working on this. But I have to confess that we have still not
managed to replicate the deep-seated rancours and festering resentments that once
characterised certain older colleges. Here by way of illustration is a passage from a
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