 On his retirement from Balliol, in 1949, Lindsay was appointed the first Principal of the University College of North Staffordshire which opened in 1949 and is now Keele University.In 1938, Lindsay stood for Parliament in the Oxford by-election as an 'Independent Progressive' on the single issue of opposition to the Munich Agreement, with support from the Labour and Liberal parties as well as from many Conservatives including the future Prime Ministers Winston Churchill, Harold Macmillan and Edward Heath, but lost to the official Conservative candidate, Quintin Hogg.In 1949 Lindsay became the Founding Principal of the University College of North Staffordshire, which opened at Keele Hall in 1950.