Editor’s Note

EDITOR’S NOTE

This year’s Gazette looks back on another very difficult year in the history of Pembroke College, and I hope reflects how well Pembroke has risen to the challenge of looking after its students – and how well the students have risen to the challenge of helping each other – against a background of limits on face-toface interactions, weekly tests for Covid-19, and many of Pembroke’s facilities being closed down for a large part of the year. We can only hope that next year will see a return to normal; but whatever next year holds, we will be going into it without some very significant figures who have been lost to Pembroke not –fortunately – because of Covid-19, but through retirement.

The Master has noted in his contribution to this Gazette that our beloved Senior Tutor, Dan Tucker, will be stepping down from that role in October after five years of superlative service to the College. His assistant, Sally Clowes, will be retiring at the same time. Speaking personally, it has been an absolute privilege to know Sal in her time here. She has always been a rock of decency, humanity, patience, and good cheer. She is one of the best persons I have ever known and will be hugely missed. Also missed will be our former Head Gardener, Nick Firman, who retired in January 2021 after an incredible 55 years working for the College, 48 of them as Head Gardener. This Gazette includes an interview with Nick, looking back on his time at Pembroke. The dividers in this Gazette are made up of some snapshots of just a few of the glories of Pembroke’s gardens that Nick is responsible for, and that will be his enduring legacy to the College.

The final retirement that I would like to acknowledge in this note is the one that hits hardest and closest to home. My assistant, Frances Kentish, will be retiring in December 2021, and as a result this Gazette will be the last produced with her help. In total, she has worked on seven Gazettes under the editorship of John Dougherty, eleven with me, and one with Chris Young (when I was on leave in 2015–16). 20% of all the Gazette’s ever produced have therefore come under Frances’ watchful eye. It is a remarkable record. Only a Shakespeare would be able to find words adequate to express the debt that I owe Frances, not just in helping me produce the Gazette, but also in our even longer-standing respective roles where I serve as Tutor for Graduate Admissions and she as Graduate Admissions Secretary. The job of Graduate Admissions Secretary is an incredibly difficult one: a fact that is not as widely appreciated as it ought to be because Frances makes it look so easy. It involves reading a huge number of files, turning them over to either me or Tim Weil (in charge of admissions decisions on the sciences side) for decision (while letting us know whether any aspects of those files warrants particular attention – in particular, whether the file belongs to a student who was accepted for a graduate place at Pembroke last year but failed to get enough funding to take up their place and is trying again this year), communicating our decisions to the University, keeping an eye on how many offers have been made across the range of different categories of postgraduate student that we accept at Pembroke and whether we are keeping a proper balance in terms of the offers we are making both between and within those different categories, while at the same time communicating with the graduate students we

make offers to (and chasing up those who have not let the College know whether they will be able to take up the places they have been offered at Pembroke) and performing a huge number of functions relating to the graduate population at Pembroke in co-ordination with Loraine Gelsthorpe, the Tutor for Graduate Affairs. That Frances was able to keep so many of these plates spinning for so long, while also helping with the production of the Gazette, and also helping the Dean with Chapel matters, and also taking charge of the arrangements for students’ graduating (as well as the traditional and yearly MA dinner) – and do all of these things perfectly – makes her one of the most remarkable people I know, and also makes her retirement richly well-deserved. Pembroke was incredibly lucky to have Frances working for it for as long as it did, and we can only hope that fortune will smile on us again when it comes to the almost impossible job of finding a replacement for her. And on a personal level, I will miss terribly her kindness, calmness, common sense, and loyalty.

Frances obviously occupies the place of honour when it comes to thanking those who have helped with the production of this year’s Gazette. I would also like to thank for their contributions to this year’s Gazette: Becky Coombs (the third and last remaining member of the remarkable team that Becky, Sal and Frances formed on LL staircase for so many years, to Pembroke’s huge benefit) and Sally Clowes; Genny Grim and Lizzy Ennion-Smith; Sally March, David Franks, Martine Goncalves and Julia Champion in the Development Office; Anna Lapwood and Andrew Morris; Firuza Melville and Jayne Ringrose; all the students who both submitted reports on this year’s activities among Pembroke’s various clubs and societies and who performed heroics in keeping those activities going under almost impossible circumstances; all those who contributed obituaries for the Deaths and Obituaries section of the Gazette; and the Fellows of Pembroke College for their various contributions to this Gazette.

N.J.M.