Which university employed J.R.R. Tolkien before his Oxford career?

Before his Oxford career, J.R.R. Tolkien worked at the University of Leeds.

Tolkien became a reader in English language at Leeds in 1920 and was promoted to professor in 1924. His time there helped establish his academic reputation in historical linguistics and medieval English literature. He also collaborated with E.V. Gordon on the influential edition of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, published in 1925.

That same year, Tolkien moved to Oxford to become Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon. Because Oxford is so closely associated with his public career, Leeds is sometimes omitted from brief biographies. His Leeds years were important, however, because they connected his language scholarship with the medieval texts that informed his imaginative writing.