Portal:University of Oxford/Selected college/25

St Anne's College began life as "The Society of Oxford Home-Students" in 1879, which was renamed "The St Anne's Society" in 1942, finally taking its present name in 1952 when it received a charter. It was originally an institution for women only, but men have been admitted since 1979. It is one of the larger colleges in Oxford, with around 440 undergraduate and 190 postgraduate students, in a roughly equal mix of men and women. The college is to the north of the city centre between Woodstock Road and Banbury Road, on land donated by St John's. Hartland House, built in 1937 and designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, was the first purpose-built college building; other buildings include the Wolfson Building from the 1960s and the Ruth Deech building (2005), named after a former principal of the college. The current principal is the journalist and television executive Tim Gardam. Alumni include the novelists Penelope Lively and Helen Fielding, the politicians Edwina Currie and Danny Alexander, magazine editor Tina Brown, and Cicely Saunders, pioneer of the hospice movement. The novelist Iris Murdoch was a fellow of the college. (Full article...)