Ahead of you is the grand sight of St John’s College. To spot it, look for a broad, perfectly green lawn stretched out in front of you, with a sturdy wooden bench nearby and old stone buildings wrapped around the grass. The centerpiece is a large gothic gateway, with sharp spires and windows that look as if they’re watching you. Just behind this gate, towers rise, and off to the right you’ll see elegant red-brick buildings and the tall square chapel tower with four points. With the sunlight sparkling across the lawns and a scattering of blossoms at your feet, it feels almost like a painting.
Imagine you’re standing here in the early morning mist of 1511. The stone walls are new, the wooden doors creak as the monastic community gets ready to close them at dusk every day. For centuries, this spot was a hospital, with sick and wounded people lying where now you see only grass and flowers.
It was Lady Margaret Beaufort, the mother of Henry VII, who decided this should be a place of learning. But things didn’t go smoothly. After she passed away, it was left to her determined chaplain, John Fisher, to battle for approval from the King, the Pope, and the Bishop of Ely. It must have felt like a wild game of medieval chess. Only after much wrangling did the college finally open its doors. As you look up at the gatehouse now, imagine it holding strong through disagreements and royal edicts, always ready to welcome-or close itself off from-the world.
St John’s became a place where history-makers walked: poets like Wordsworth, abolitionists who changed the entire British Empire, twelve Nobel winners, a future king-each left their footsteps on these stones.
If you listen closely, you might even catch a snippet of the famous St John’s choir warming up, or laughter from the college’s May Ball echoing across the courts. And who knows, perhaps a ghost or two from those early, uncertain years is still peeking through an upstairs window. Nothing here ever stands still, not for long-not for 500 years!
Interested in a deeper dive into the buildings and grounds, college choirs or the traditions and legends? Join me in the chat section for an insightful conversation.
