Living History: Rebecca Fitzgerald

My defining moment at Trinity

In my early days as a Fellow I often walked across the hallowed grass with my toddlers in tow clutching toys and bags. The Porters would inevitably stop me to ask me to step off the grass. After some time passed they would smile and say “Hello Ma’am” instead, which my children said meant I “was old”. During one Supervision snow fell and the undergraduates begged me to accompany them across the virgin white carpet on the Great Court lawns. An embellished version of the anecdote made its way into a children’s novel The Diamond of Drury Lane by Julia Golding when the young heroine, Cat, cartwheeled across Great Court. Seventeen years on, walking through splendid Great Court never fails to make me smile.

Rebecca Fitzgerald is Professor of Cancer Prevention at the Medical Research Council Cancer Unit at Cambridge, and Honorary Consultant in Gastroenterology at Addenbrooke’s NHS Trust. She was elected a Fellow of Trinity in 2002. She is the Advisor to Women Students at the College.