Encounter: Keith Murray

When I went back to Oxford in 1949, Keith Murray was the director of Lincoln College. He had an unusual career, in that he had begun his association with the college (at the time one of Oxford's poorest) as Bursar. It is most unusual for someone whose university career begins in looking after the finances, and ends up being elected as the Head of the college. Keith was an agronomist who received a Commonwealth Fund Fellowship to spend three years at Cornell, where he obtained his PhD. In 1953, after retiring from the Rectorship of England, Keith was appointed chairman of the university grants committee. He had a distinguished career in various fields until his death in 1993 at the age of ninety.