When Polly
met Natalie

Despite the forty-five years separating their respective matriculations, the favourite Clare memories of Polly O’Hanlon and Natalie Chapman bear striking similarities. “Mine was from my third year,” Polly says. “I and my then boyfriend, who was also a historian, plucked up the courage to invite Charles Parkin, our Director of Studies, to dinner in our rooms on M staircase. We thought this was a terribly daring thing to do, and weren’t at all sure if he would accept. But he did come, and he was warm and friendly, and he treated us as intellectual equals. It was the most wonderful and revelatory evening. I think that was one thing that confirmed my sense that I wanted to go on and be an academic.”

By coincidence, Natalie’s Director of Studies was also a Charles – Classics Fellow and Praelector, Charlie Weiss –and was also the catalyst for her favourite Clare memories. “He was a wonderful DoS to study under,” Natalie says. “I loved going on the Reading Week trips which Charlie would organise every year. We went to Croatia, and also to Thessaloniki in Greece. They were wonderful experiences, and were all thanks to him organising them.”

Polly nods. “Somehow it’s when your teachers cross the line and treat you as partners in a shared intellectual exercise, it transforms your whole experience,” she adds. “It’s nice to hear that’s still happening at Clare, and still matters to a recent graduate.”

Polly was part of the first group of women to join the College as undergraduates in 1972.

She recalls with appreciation the lengths and efforts that the Fellowship of the College had gone to in order to make the new cohort of women undergraduates feel welcome, particularly in their accommodation and bathroom facilities. Despite this, it was difficult to ignore the pressure of their new situation, and the antagonism that she and her small group of classmates were sometimes met with: “Some of the more old-school undergraduates felt that we were going to dilute the quality of the rugby team.”

Some efforts to welcome female students were more successful than others. One recollection of after-dinner drinks in the SCR now stands out to Polly as particularly humorous. “At one side of the room, very sweetly, were gathered the Fellows’ wives – in those days it was wives – and the women undergraduates were gently ushered towards these ladies, who were very kind and good-natured. Of course, partly we were very relieved to see some other women, but part of us thought, rather grumpily, why are we talking to the wives and not the Fellows? It was meant with the best of intentions, which I think we appreciated, but of course if that were to happen now, it would be met with outrage! Firstly, why should anyone denigrate a wife, and why should the women undergraduates not be treated in the same way as the male undergraduates? It just shows how times have changed!”

Natalie was also one of only a few from her school to come to Cambridge in 2017. “I was nervous, not knowing anyone who would be in my College.” She had initially applied to and interviewed at Newnham College. “It being a women-only college was not my primary motivation to applying for Newnham –I was mostly drawn by the beautiful grounds, close proximity to the Sidgwick site and the presence of famous classicist Mary Beard. Yet nonetheless I did believe I would get on very well at a women’s college after attending an all-girls secondary school and thoroughly appreciating the atmosphere there.”

However, this did not cause Natalie any disappointment when she received an open offer and found she would be attending Clare. “In fact, I was absolutely thrilled as it had been one of the other top contenders I was considering applying for. In hindsight I’m now very glad I attended a mixed college, as I don’t believe I would have been able to make such varied and diverse friendships if my immediate peer group had been limited to one gender. Furthermore, I’m not sure that the many benefits of a single gender environment I experienced at secondary agenecessarily extend to University.” This had meant, however, that she had only ever seen pictures of Clare online before starting her studies here. “That was rather nerve-wracking, but when I arrived, it was such an enjoyable and exciting experience.”

With forty-five years of coeducation under the College’s belt when she joined, Natalie's experience as a woman at Clare was one which felt wholly natural. “I’d say there was an obvious awareness of the issues women still face in society generally, but I don’t feel that while I was in Clare or in Cambridge that I was aware of any particular difference that I would face as a woman. In Classics, I believe there are more women studying than there are men, so in that setting I didn’t feel out of place at all.”

“What is remarkable is how quickly women did become an unquestioned part of the community,” Polly recalls, "and I think that happened much more quickly at Clare than at some other colleges. Barely three or four years after the admission of women, people didn’t think a thing about it. I think that is testimony to the Fellows

who were there, who are now either very senior or no longer with us. They were a wonderful generation of Fellows: people whose principal interest was in the life of the mind, in books and in conversations, and it’s wonderful to hear that those traditions live on in Clare.”
The success of integrating women into life at Clare causes both Natalie and Polly to reflect on the challenges that the College still faces in widening participation. “Unfortunately I think that when single sex colleges became coeducational, these groups of incredibly able women from all over the country may have displaced communities of young men from what we would now call comprehensives,” Polly says. “I know how hard the College works to broaden the schools and areas from which it draws new pools of applicants, and that is still obviously an ongoing job.”

Natalie, as one of Clare’s most recent graduates, experienced a unique set of challenges finishing her studies under the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Both Polly and Natalie are part of a group who are helping to organise a programme of celebrations in 2022 to mark the 50th anniversary of women undergraduates joining Clare. “I think this will be a really interesting opportunity to delve into the history of the College, which was, after all, founded by a woman,” Natalie says. “It will also be a chance for current students to get to know alumni, and especially female alumnae, which will be a fascinating dynamic.”

For Polly, the forthcoming anniversary gives the chance to reflect on what has and what has not changed for women in that time. “From the time that I came to Cambridge, all sorts of glass ceilings have been broken, and young women are able to take certain opportunities for granted. In the early seventies, I was very aware that the changes that were happening here were just a small part of changes that were happening throughout society. But looking back I’m also struck by some things that you encounter as you go through life which are still very challenging today, for example in combining a professional career with a family life.”

As they look ahead to the future, they find it difficult to imagine what life might be like for the women of Clare in another 50 years’ time. “I’m afraid my one hope,” says Polly, “is that they have a habitable world to live in. I think that for anyone who is my age, in their 60s, their thoughts for the longer term future must be dominated by what is rightly being called a climate emergency.”

“I also hope,” Natalie adds, “that the women of Clare will feel that their gender is by no means a barrier to them, not just at university, but throughout their lives and careers.” Polly agrees. “I have faith that it will be those women who will be at the forefront of finding sustainable ways to live on our planet, and of finding solutions to those problems.”