Swansea University marks 90th anniversary

The university has run out of space at its campus on Swansea's seafront due to the expansion of the last 40 years.

Neil Prior
BBC News

As Swansea University celebrates the 90th anniversary of the royal charter which created it, vice chancellor Richard B Davies says that in order to flourish in the next 90 it needs to look back to its roots.

"The university was demanded by the people of Swansea, to serve the people of Swansea, at a time when we needed young engineers, metallurgists, chemists and geologists to guide a nation at the peek of our industrial and mining power," he said.

"That's a lesson we're going to have to take into the 21st Century. The days of universities being distant institutions for the intrinsic good of learning are gone.

"In order to survive another 90 years the local community needs to see our relevance to their lives, every day, in everything which they do."

But it could all have happened 60 years earlier.

A second university campus is planned outside the city Enlarge Image

In the 1850s, a campaign for a university in south Wales, largely funded by industrialists in Swansea and the surrounding area, resulted in Cardiff being chosen as the location - much to the consternation of the majority of the backers.

It took until 1918 for the push for a university in Swansea to once again develop critical momentum.

A report by Viscount Haldane of Cloan concluded: "A university that would not simply educate young men and women, but one that would apply science to the needs of industry and give rise to a new generation of engineers and scientists who would drive the region's industrial growth and secure its economic future."

The first college building was built on land from the estate of Sir Henry Vivian.

However, having the parliamentary approval for a theoretical university, and actually opening one were very different matters.

It took two further years of lobbying and fund-raising, primarily by tin-plate manufacturer Francis Gilbertson and editor of the South Wales Daily Post Alderman David Davies, before the necessary £70,000 was raised.

The royal charter was eventually signed on 22 January 1920.

Just six months later, on 19 July 1920, King George V came to Swansea to lay the first ceremonial foundation stone of what was to become The Abbey building, on land in Singleton Park, donated from the estate of copper baron Sir Henry Vivian.

In the September the university opened its doors for the first time, offering degrees in metallurgy, physics, engineering, mathematics, chemistry, history and geology.

Alumni include (clockwise from top right) Sir Terry Matthews, Kingsley Amis, Nicky Wire and Lyn Evans

That year's in-take numbered just 89, but significantly eight of them were women - at the time the highest percentage of females at any university in Britain.

According to Mr Davies it was the sort of ground-breaking move which set the tone for the university's future.

"From the very outset Swansea University had a reputation for meritocracy," he expanded.

"On the day we opened we had the greatest proportion of female students in the UK, which culminated in Dr Mary Williams being appointed Britain's first ever lady professor, when the chair for French language and literature was created in 1922.

"We were also amongst the first universities to routinely seek bursaries to allow gifted students from working class backgrounds to study with us.

"My own grandmother, the penniless daughter of an illiterate Treharris miner, came here to train as a teacher in the late 1920s and early 30s. That sort of thing would have been inconceivable before the university opened in Swansea."

During WWII the university's enviable reputation for engineering and chemistry saw the Woolwich Arsenal establish their department of explosives research in Swansea - developing many of the land and sea mines which helped win the war.

But it was in the post-war years that Swansea started churning out the sort of notable alumni which began to make people talk about them - if not quite in the same breath as Oxford and Cambridge - then certainly in the same conversation.

Aside from an entire raft of Welsh politicians and sports stars, amongst the house-hold names to study or teach at Swansea are: Celtic Manor entrepreneur Sir Terry Matthews, 'Angry Young Man' novelist Kingsley Amis, Starbucks CEO Martin Coles, Nicky Wire and Richey Edwards of The Manic Street Preachers, and most excitingly of all for vice chancellor Davies, Lyn Evans, project leader of the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.

The original library still stands at Swansea University

"It is hugely significant to have a Swansea connection with CERN, and thanks to our relationship with Lyn, dozens of our physics students have had the opportunity to travel to Switzerland to witness the Hadron Collider working for themselves.

"That's a good example of the sort of relationships we're trying to foster with businesses and other academic institutions to ensure we stay relevant and up-to-date in the 21st Century."

Today also represents the official launch of the 10 year countdown to the centenary, including ambitious plans for a second campus near Llandarcy, east of the city, and commercial research tie-ins with companies including BP, Rolls Royce Aviation and IBM.

"The Swansea University of another 90 years will look unrecognisable even to us, let alone to the likes of the Vivians and Gilbertsons who founded it," said Mr Davies.

"But I'm sure that the principles will be very familiar to the founders.

"We want to become leaders and pioneers in science - not only the theory of science, but also its practical application.

"We have a crisis in this country of children turning their backs on science, partly because it's difficult, but more so because it seems irrelevant.

"If we can show them that science is exciting, that a university in their city is using science to make jets faster, computers more powerful and sky-scrapers taller, then we can help to secure another 90 years of innovation and prosperity for both the university and the city."