SPOONER

Spooner remained at New College for more than sixty years, serving as fellow (1867), lecturer (1868), tutor (1869), dean (1876–1889) and warden (1903–1924). He lectured on ancient history, divinity and philosophy (especially on Aristotle's ethics). According to Oxford admissions there is no-one with that name. It is likely that Spooner was thinking of a Mr E T Cook, i.e. Edward Tyas Cook, who matriculated at New College in 1876, and was elected a scholar the same year. It appears that Spooner transposed the "K" sound from the beginning of the surname, "Cook", and swung it round to be the preceding sound of the nearest initial, giving that initial as "K" rather than "T" thereby turning it into a Spoonerism. Cook went on to be President of the Oxford Union. When he graduated, he got a Double First. Still later, he founded The Westminster Gazette, and, perhaps inevitably at this point, was knighted: