Music playing
The 1982 setting for Walton Hall, the very heart of The Open University
a far cry from its appearance in 1969. The dilapidated hall stood amid fields
and woodland secluded to the point of being forgotten.
The only other building on the estate, the 14th C St Michael's church was
equally in need of restoration and only in occasional use.
The overgrown drive seems an unlikely approach to a new and open university.
The first task was to make the hall weatherproof and habitable whilst
over on the west side low rise blocks were being built for the first academic staff
already involved in producing the first foundation courses. All new building was
to be in brick, relatively cheap and available straight from the Bedfordshire
kilns nearby. The second priority was to provide temporary accommodation for the
library - an essential backup for academics working under pressure. There
were few concessions to architectural style, rapid construction and convenience
were the order of the day. Foundations were already appearing for the
laboratories urgently needed to develop the first home experiment kits for the
Science foundation course. The only planning protection was given to the rose
garden at the side of the hall and the mature trees on the estate.
The hall itself had a special destiny after its restoration to house the top
people. Some minor refurbishing of the entrance hall created a main reception
area. Unchanged but beautifully restored was the original 19th C finely carved oak
staircase. This led to the principle offices on the first floor for the Vice
Chancellor, the University Secretary and their supporting staff. The first
occasion to attract the press to Walton Hall was the visit of Lord Mountbatten
who was invited to open the now completed new buildings which were already in use.
He was received by the Open University's first Chancellor Lord Crowther,
the Pro Chancellor and Chairman of the planning committee Sir Peter Venables, and
the Vice Chancellor. The minister given responsibility by Harold Wilson for
launching the university, Jennie Lee, was among the guests.
[Lord Crowther] Lord Mountbatten, Pro Chancellor, Vice Chancellor,
my lords, ladies and gentlemen
we are met here this morning to mark the formal completion of the first phase of
the construction of this permanent home for the Open University. Now it might at
first sight seem odd that an institution who's habitat is the air, which only
narrowly escaped being called the University of the Air, should need a
local habitation as well as a name.
I suppose that when the idea of an open university was first
mooted the natural assumption might have been that it would occupy a few floors of
some anonymous office building in London. That may have been the natural assumption
but it was clearly the wrong one. We are not a society for the propagation of this
or for the abolition of that. We are, we will be, and we are one of the great
permanent institutions of the country and though our nature is inevitably largely
aerial, electronic, invisible, we must put down a toe on earth somewhere. We count it
a great privilege to be able to have Admiral of the Fleet, Lord Mountbatten
of Burma to perform this dedication ceremony for us. We are greatly honoured
by his presence. Lord Mountbatten. [clapping]
[Lord Mountbatten] Mr Chancellor, Mr Pro Chancellor, Mr Vice Chancellor, ladies and
gentlemen. I am indeed honoured to be invited to open The Open University but it
at first puzzle, how one could make an university more open than its name already
implied. But I gather it is the buildings which house the staff and the means of
dissemination of programmes that are to be opened today and I am proud to perform the
opening ceremony. This is a test of technology, will the strings work?
[clapping]