Talk:Bridge of Sighs (Cambridge)
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The story of the Austin Mini cannot be correct.
The Mini did not start manufacture until 1959 - and it's unlikely that anyone would do that to a brand new car - so if the story *IS* true - then it's either not a Mini or it was a long time after 1957.
I have to say, noting what's been said on the Talk:Punting page, that this story sounds suppicously simillar to the (true) story about the Austin on Senate House Roof... just a thought... MikeMorley 17:30, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
I've scoured the web looking for more information about this - and find that almost every reference is an identical copy of the same report. One guy who visited Cambridge on holiday wrote a blog entry describing a tour he'd been given in which BOTH the story of the Mini on the Senate house roof *AND* the Mini slung under the bridge were reported as true.
Certainly there are MANY pranks involving the poor, long suffering Mini - the students at Loughborough hauled a Mini up the side of a 10 storey residential block and left it on the roof. I myself (with a crowd of drunken friends) carried a Mini through the corridors of the Elliot college at the University of Kent at Canturbury into our main dining hall - which requiring the car to be turned on it's side to get it through some of the narrower doorways.
[edit] The gripping conclusion of the dangling car story
Well, for those who care for the truth: I got a very definitive answer from Johnathan Harrison (who I surmise is a Librarian at St.Johns). He included no less than four newspaper clippings from the day each incident happened all of which had photographs. Firstly, it happened not once - but twice. Once in 1963 and again in 1968. In the first incident a 1928 Austin Seven (not a Mini) - one photo shows the car dangling under the bridge - the other shows workmen standing on what looks (to the uninitiated) like a large punt with an Austin Seven sitting right there in the boat. The second clipping says that it is believed that student brought the car under the bridge on four punts lashed together.
The second incident (1968) was using a car called "The Bond Bug" - a hideous 3-wheeled contraption. This time the newspapers had evidently interviewed the students. The car had once again been punted under the bridge using an unspecified number of punts lashed together and with 13 foot planks laid across them to support the car. There is a photo in one of the clippings showing the fire brigade removing the car and a picture of the car supported very precariously on two standard-sized punts - both of which appear to be on the virge of sinking under the weight!
I'm going to try to find someplace to post the four press clippings - but the copyright issues may be a problem.
I'm changing that section of the article now.
SteveBaker 15:09, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
