April 1947 – Editorial
Lovers of statistics will probably find some subtle and abstruse connection between the date 1881, 1895 and 1947. These were all hard winters.
That of 1881 was remarkable for its snow and old Oxford residents can remember piles of it that were thrown over Magdalen Bridge until it was level with the parapet where some of it hung about until June.
1895 was the celebrated occasion when wagonettes drove down the Isis to Iffley and the sheep was roasted whole on the ice at Sandford.
But 1947 seems to have combine length with severity of cold and the frequent falls of snow effectively prevented even one possible item on the credit side, a supply of good ice for skating. Certainly this has been a remarkable School Term, in that no games of any sort have been possible, and the Cross Country and Athletics have been impossible.
Transport on two occasions caused over 100 absentees, but, thanks to the electrical nature of our heating system, we were not deprived of current (being a school) and, though cold, we carried on even through the worst of it.
We had a few bursts, of course; the worst was in the kitchen and school meals were impossible for two days, and those of us who could not get home in the dinner hour were compelled to have recourse to sandwiches.
(Editorial, Vol XXXIX ii, April 1947, No 130)