KATRIONA Ormiston is right when she writes (December 13) that 20 Northmoor Road, J.R.R. Tolkien’s home from 1929-1947, is the only one to have been graced with a Blue Plaque (since December 2002).
Headingtonians, however, have long been familiar with a fine stone tablet placed above the garage at 76 Sandfield Road, where Professor Tolkien lived with his wife, Edith, from 1953 to 1968. The Sandfield Road tablet bears evocative carving: on its top left is a representation of the dragon Smaug (from The Hobbit), perhaps on his last flight during which Bard, the captain of the archers, prepares to unleash the black arrow with which he, Bard, will slay Smaug, the greatest dragon of the Third Age.
On the right of the tablet, carved across three lines, runs the inscription: J.R.R. Tolkien lived here 1953-1968.
BRUCE ROSS-SMITH
Bowness Avenue
Headington
Oxford
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