h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The University of Reading was originally an 'extension college' of the University of Oxford, and became a university in its own right in 1926 - the only one to receive that status between the world wars, making it hard to categorise in terms of the endless redefinitions of the term "New University". It's oldest existing campus, London Road, betrays this history wonderfully, with its grand hall and covered quadrangles/cloisters.

Nowadays, that campus is used mainly for ceremonies, exams, and various oddments, with the main campus being Whitenights, the grounds of a stately home, acquired in 1947. Despite housing a sprawling mixture of buildings (some of them, like the 6-storey Wantage Hall, just plain ugly; some eye-catching for better reasons, like the Urban & Regional Studies building - known as "the Lego building", because it looks like it has been built with some giant construction toy) it also manages to fit in a large lake, and an area of woodland aptly called "The Wilderness". Most new building is taking place at the "Earley Gate", the other side of the Wilderness than the older ones, where war-time prefab huts still house part of the Art department, but are slowly being replaced by an interconnecting maze of new teaching blocks.

Throughout its early history, the University was funded by the families behind Huntley & Palmer's, a local biscuit factory, which sadly no longer exists. It has also merged with various local colleges, including Bulmershe College, a teacher training college, which is now Bulmershe campus, housing the Education department - kind of obvious, really; they do Drama and the like there, too.

The University is particularly associated with Agriculture, and actually owns a large number of farms around the area. Every summer sees the mysterious appearance of signs scribbled everywhere promoting the 'Agric Bash' - what this actually involves remained a mystery to me during my 3 years there. Less mysterious to me (though quite hard to define to anyone else) is another notable department, 'Cybernetics' - you may have come upon Kevin Warwick, a larger-than-life researcher there who demonstrates robots, gets enthusiastic about chips in his arm, and is generally pretty good for publicity...

Erm, what else to say? Perhaps that'll do to start someone off (I fear I shan't have the time to polish a whole article, though you never know!)

http://www.rdg.ac.uk/ - main site
http://www.rusu.co.uk/ - Student Union, including the student radio station, Junction 11

Lots of info - thanks very much, Mr Mathrubers!

Founded in 1892 (an 'extension college' as you say).

Famous alumni: Suzanne Charlton (weather presenter), Olympic rower James Cracknell, and composer of the Planet Suite, Gustav Holst! (He was also a lecturer there, apparently).

What's it like to be a student there? Is the nightlife good? Is there lots to do in the surrounding area?

Wow - that's virtually an Entry there...are you sure you don't want to turn it into one?

Whitenights: Should be Whiteknights.

"... like the 6-storey Wantage Hall, just plain ugly...": Whilst I'm not the biggest fan of Wantage, it's not six stories tall and so I suspect you're talking about Windsor Hall.

"Every summer sees the mysterious appearance of signs scribbled everywhere promoting the 'Agric Bash' - what this actually involves remained a mystery to me during my 3 years there.": It was a nice big party somewhere off campus (I think on a field owned by the university somewhere nr Reading).

http://www.rusu.co.uk/ - Student Union, including the student radio station, Junction 11 - and of course the excellent student newspaper Spark!