No.128
and did not qualify for the 1500
final. Was it also part of the wider
education for pupils which he so
thoroughly espoused?
Hew Bruce-Gardyne (K, 84-89): I had
cause to recruit a handful of PhD
astrophysicists a couple of years ago.
I gave them them Q8, complete with
instructions that it be solved quickly
and without calculator, and they were
flummoxed.
I strongly believe that the truly
great thing about Win Coll was that
it could set such apparently – to
the outside world – absurdly high
standards. Cocooned within the
bubble, we were unaware that said
standards were absurdly high, so
just set about trying to attain them.
I was blissfully unaware that any
such war was raging through the
Mathmā Department, but we were
undoubtedly the better for it.
Luke Dolman (C, 85-88): I have, for
years, attempted to describe Funky’s
mannerisms, general appearance
and eccentricities to friends and
family, mostly, it must be said, to
polite indulgence. However, this
indulgence has verged on outright
scepticism whenever I have described
the occasion on which he fell out of a
window. I cannot remember for sure
why it was open, or who opened it,
but I have a hazy recollection that it
was a prank. Funky used to sit folded
completely inside the window frame
with his back against one side and his
feet up on the sill pressed against the
other. On this occasion, he leaned
back against empty space and fell
– my memory is he fell incredibly
slowly – backwards with hardly a hint
of flailing before hitting the ground
outside. This would have been
enough to create the legend but it
was cemented when he simply got up,
walked back through the passageway
and carried on with the lesson, as if
nothing had happened. You can only
imagine my delight at finally being
The Trusty Servant
able to show written proof to my wife
and children!
John Woolmer (Co Ro, 63-75): The
highly entertaining ‘Algebra Wars’
rather fails to do justice to the serious
success of the School Mathematics
Project. Its real heroes (from a Win
Coll standpoint) were Sir Desmond
Lee (Informator) and Tom Jones
(long-time head of Mathmā) who,
circa 1961, with seven other schools,
took the enormous risk of helping to
launch SMP. Win Coll was producing
many top-class mathematicians
and any change of emphasis in its
teaching was fraught with dangers.
SMP was a bold undertaking, seeking
to change the way that Mathmā was
taught and understood. The Times
(Nov 20 th , 2014) extolled the virtue of
SMP while lamenting the decline in
the standards of current British text
books. I rest my case.
‘Bogling for Ekker’ (TS127)
Hubert Montagu-Pollock (Coll, 48-53):
On reading Ian Alexander’s article,
it occurred to me that the correct
spelling of the word that is indeed
pronounced as ‘Bogle’ is in fact
‘Bogwheel’. I enjoyed his evocation
of cycling freedom up in the chalk
downs, which brought back memories
of trips to chat to itinerant charcoal-
burners near Farley Mount and of
long rides to small dusty hot churches
in remote parts of Hampshire, the
purpose of these being the ringing
of bells, once my friend Maurice
Keen had managed to get in touch
with the various vicars and get their
permission. Fortunately for bogling,
the amount of motor traffic was
minuscule even if we had to use the
odd stretch of A road, as this was a
couple of decades before Ian’s time.
How much long-distance bogling at
Win Coll is there now?
‘Tolling: the Golden Years’ (TS127)
Leo Aylen (Coll, 47-53): I was Prefect
of Hall and Captain of Athletics at
Winchester, and I did manage to set
18
up an athletics match in my final
summer term. (In the Winchester
Steeplechase I had a cramp, and
misjudged the gap I had to catch
up, and so only came third.) But I
did also run cross-country, and kept
running until about ten years ago
when a knee had to be replaced. (I’m
now recovering from the operation
on my second knee.) I carried on
running at Oxford with the Tortoises,
and basking in Bannister glory in
the summer of 1957 we challenged
Cambridge to a road race. They
refused, so we decided to run the
880 miles from Land’s End to John
O’Groats instead. We did it in 105
hours, thereby setting a world record.
Last year I attended the Oxford-
Cambridge athletics match, and was
hosted by the Oxford second string
for the 800. We discovered that our
personal bests were only two seconds
apart. Not bad when I was running
half miles, 8 yards further than 800
metres, and of course, on cinder
with those hideous long spikes! The
2018 first string was quite a lot faster.
I was only mediocre at Oxford. But,
apart from Bannister, Oxford middle
distance then was very strong, and we
did have the world-record holder for
the half mile at the time.
Leo’s account of his world-record run,
written for the Oxford Alumni online
magazine, can be found at www.
wincollsoc.org.
Monty Rendall
Max Rendall (I, 47-52): I was amused to
see Monty Rendall’s radio at Butley
Priory (TS126). In the late 1940s my
family went to live at Butley with my
great uncle, who was in failing health.
I may be able to shed some light on
the meaning of the Greek inscription,
as I am virtually certain that it said
‘The voice of the ether’. He was
much given to quotations – usually in
Greek.