{"id":11485,"date":"2026-05-01T09:08:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T08:08:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/?p=11485"},"modified":"2026-05-01T09:08:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T08:08:17","slug":"john-smith-1980","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/john-smith-1980\/","title":{"rendered":"John Smith: 1980"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\" style=\"text-align: justify\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/files\/2024\/08\/BookReaderPreview-e1723817267879.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"241\" height=\"380\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-11668\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/files\/2024\/08\/BookReaderPreview-e1723817267879.jpg\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>I have featured former college secretary John Smith in a previous blog that you can see <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/john-smith-2006\/\">here<\/a>. However, that recording, which was part of the college&#8217;s 2007 centenary events, was his recollections of his time working at Imperial. This interview that I discovered in the STOIC video archive includes some fascinating details about his life prior to coming to Imperial as college secretary.<\/p>\r\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">Not many may have known that he was Governor of the former Gilbert and Ellis Islands and had authored a number of books. The book mentioned in this interview (right) can still be found on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.co.uk\/Nigeria-Crisis-Beyond-John-Oyinbo\/dp\/0853140723\">Amazon<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">In this 13 March 1980 black and white interview, former STOIC Chairman Mike Prosser is speaking to John Smith in the College TV Studio.<\/p>\r\n<p><div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/2qcn2vAos6M?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-GB&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div><\/p>\r\n<p><strong>Colin Grimshaw May 2026<\/strong><\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Another discovery with this 1980 interview with former college secretary John Smith. He talks about his time as Governor of the former Gilbert and Ellis Islands and as an author!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3921,18461,80],"tags":[603],"class_list":["post-11485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog-update","category-college-history","category-people","tag-administration"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcL1pf-2Zf","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11485"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11485\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12488,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11485\/revisions\/12488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.imperial.ac.uk\/videoarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}