Blogs
William Henry Preece
Born this day 1834, in Caernarfon
Sir William Henry Preece electrical engineer and inventor. He is regarded as the communications pioneer who was instrumental in bringing the telephone to Britain and helped Marconi to give radio to the world.
Preece, who was chief engineer for Britain’s General Post Office and Marconi began their association, when Marconi came to London hoping his invention would appeal the Brish Navy. With Preece's support and successful experiments in South Wales, Marconi successfully transmitted from Cornwall to Newfoundland in 1901. Later Marconi set up a powerful radio station at Waunfawr, near Preece's hometown of Caernarfon.
On 15th February 1996 the Sea Empress ran aground at the entrance to Milford Haven harbour.
The grounding of the Sea Empress resulted in one of the largest and most environmentally damaging oil spills in European history. Approximately 72,000 tonnes of crude oil escaped into the sea, with more than 100km of coastline becoming seriously polluted. Thousands of birds were killed as a result and shore seaweeds and invertebrates were also killed in large quantities.
The fact that the spill occurred, in February, when many migratory animals had not yet arrived back in Pembrokeshire for breeding and the stormy weather which would have dispersed the oil was not as bad as initially predicted, meant that by the spring of 1997, there was very little evidence of the oiling and by 2001 the affected marine wildlife population levels had more-or-less returned to normal.
The Sea Empress was repaired and renamed, it is currently known as Wind 3, but remains prohibited from entering Milford Haven.
Walter Coffin (1784 – 15 February 1867) is generally regarded as the first person to mine coal in the Rhondda Valley on an industrial scale.
Coffin initially joined his families tan ning business in Bridgend, but in 1809, he decided to prospect for coal at Dinas Uchaf Farm near Llantrisant, which was owned by his father. He began by digging into the mountainside and soon struck a good quality seam, which encouraged him to sink a vertical shaft, which again was successful. Coffin now realised that he needed to address three major problems if he was to capitalize on his discovery of good quality bituminous coal.
1) There were few skilled miners in the locality;
The Rhondda at that time was a very rural area, so Coffin built rows of miners cottages for workers from areas such as Bridgend, Llansamlet Penderyn, Llantrisant and Llanharan.
2) There we re no nearby transport links;
Richard Griffiths, had constructed a tramroad from his coal levels near Pontypridd to meet the Glamorganshire Canal, for onward transport to Cardiff Docks. So Coffin constructed his own tramroad to connect with Griffiths's and the two men made an arrangement to ensure that all coal from the Lower Rhondda used their transport system.
3) There was no proven market;
Coffin started to market his coal as "Coffin's Coal"and it gained an excellent reputation for its quality. Then he moved to Cardiff in 1812 and improved his profile by becoming a Justice of the Peace, an alderman, the mayor of Cardiff and finally MP for Cardiff.
In February 1998 Britain's first official register of landscapes of outstanding historic interest was published by Cadw, listing 58 of Wales' landscapes.
The Register is an attempt to safeguard the distinctive characteristics of each place and how they have evolved, to aid planners and developers to be sympathetic to the historic character of the landscape,when introducing changes.
Hello all --- House of Angels (volume 2 of the Angel Mountain saga) is free for # Kindle for 5 days as from today . Martha takes a terrible revenge on the villains who have done untold damage to her and her family. This is a Regency tale, but Jane Austen would not have approved -- her little world was so placid that she wouldn't have survived for a moment in the Wild West of Wales.
Five of the 8 novels of the Saga are available for the Kindle -- download and enjoy!!
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B007VOW7LS
Brian
From the Wikipedia:-
Paper Aeroplanes are an alternative pop band from West Wales formed around 2009, although both members have played together since 2005. Their fanbase has been built up around early years gigging in Cardiff and UK wide after extensive touring. READ MORE
More great tracks from Paper Aeroplanes:-
- Aberystwyth
- In The Bleak Midwinter
- Stones Inside Your Head - Shankleman Remix
- A Comfortable Sleep
- My First Love
Links:-
Paper Aeroplanes - Lost, Live in Berlin
Born this day 1890, in Tenby
Nina Hamnett - artist and writer who became known as the Queen of Bohemia.
After leaving the London School of Art, Hamnett went to Paris to study and became a well-known bohemian personality. Over the course of her life, she was associated with many leading figures in the artistic community, such as; Dylan Thomas, Augustus John, Amedo Modigliani, Pablo Picasso and Serge Diaghilev. She was flamboyant, unconventional and sexually promiscuous, one story says that she once danced nude on a Montparnasse café table just for the "hell of it". She died in 1956 after falling forty feet out her apartment window.
Born this day 1983, in Sennybridge, Powys
Rhydian Roberts popularly known as Rhydian, is a classically trained baritone, musical theatre actor and television presenter, who is best known for finishing as runner-up on The X Factor in 2007.
Born this day 1829, in Tregaron
Thomas Benbow Phillips, who was a pioneer of an attempted Welsh settlement in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.
In May 1851, Phillips was sponsered by cotton traders from Manchester to establish a colony in Brazil to grow cotton for their mills in Lancashire and was joined by six groups of Welsh immigrants. However, the settlement failed, because most of the immigrants had backgrounds in the mining industry and found work in the Brazilian coal mines more profitable than growing cotton.
He later moved to the Welsh colony of Y Wladfa, in Patagonia, becoming one of it's most prominent members, travelling to London in 1898 to present the British government with a list of the community's grievances against the government of Argentina. However, the government in London refused to entertain demands that it should assert sovereignty over the settlement.
The Landshipping mining disaster
On 14th February 1844, 40 men, women and boys were killed by the flooding of the Garden Pit coal-mine at Landshipping on the eastern branch of the Cleddau River.
The pit extended out under the river for as much as a quarter of a mile and when water suddenly burst through the walls of the mine, trapping the 40 miners underground at the time. The cause of the disaster was put down to the pressure of the water, as that particular heading had not, previously, been worked at high water.
Coal mining in Pembrokeshire;
Pembrokeshire once had a thriving mining industry. There had been mining in the area since the Middle Ages but it was transformed in 1800, when Sir Hugh Owen brought in a steam engine at his mine in Landshipping and soon over 10,000 tons of coal were being produced each year. The industry developed further with the subsequent building of a quay at Landshipping , after which over 50 pits and mines were located throughout the county.
Some remains can still be found, at Wisemans Bridge, Cresswell Quay and Trefrane Cliff Colliery near Nolton. The demand for coal declined at the second half of the 19th Century and this led to the closure of most of the collieries. However, Hook Colliery remained open until 1948 and the one at Wood Level at Kilgetty until 1950.
An Interview With Gwynedd Tourism Officer, Alun Fon Williams - Celticos/AmeriCymru Trail Tour
By Ceri Shaw, 2013-02-14
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Gwynedd Tourism Officer Speaks About Celticos AmeriCymru Trail Tour
Alun Fon Williams is the tourism officer for Gwynedd. A responsible position when you consider that Gwynedd comprises the whole of north west Wales and that the tourist industry in this area is worth 900 million GBP annually ( 1350 million dollarsapprox ). In this interview Alun speaks about his job with specific reference to the Celticos/AmeriCymru Trail Tour which is designed to cater for Americans visiting north Wales who have an interest in exploring their historic roots in the area.
Alun also talks about his own familial connections with America and reveals that his great great great grandfather Robert E. Owens migrated to the USA and became one of the largest cattle barons in the State of Iowa.
Biography of Robert E. Owens
Iowa County, IA Biographies
Robert E. Owens was one of the extensive landowners of Iowa county, owning eight hundred and forty acres, his home being in Troy township. He was born in Anglesea, Wales, in 1835, and was one of a family of fifteen children. The only one now living is a brother, D. L. Owens, a resident of Lime Springs, Iowa. read more here
Enjoy the interview and dont forget to head on over to the Forum and nominate your favorite Welsh American or American of Welsh descent in order to be entered in our competition to win two tickets for the Celticos/AmeriCymru Trail Tour. Here is the post ( instructions on the page ):- Competition: Unique Tour of North Wales - Win a Place For Two on the AmeriCymru North Wales Tour
On 13th February 1962, writer and political activist Saunders Lewis delivered a now famous radio lecture entitled Tynged yr Iaith -the Fate of the Language, which was instrumental in the formation of Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg (the Welsh language Society) and, therefore, the implementation of most of the current bilingual policies.
In the lecture, Lewis predicted the decline and eventual death of the Welsh language if Welsh speakers did not refuse to fill in all types of official forms if it was not possible for them to do so in Welsh, even if it resulted in imprisonment.
On 13th February 1923, BBC broadcasting in Wales began when the British Broadcasting Company (as it then was) made its first radio broadcast from "Station 5WA" in Cardiff. Blaina-born baritone Mostyn Thomas opened the programme, singing Dafydd y Garreg Wen and Gwilym Davies became the first speaker to broadcast in the Welsh language.
Born this day 1891, in Rhosgadfan, Gwynedd.
Kate Roberts, who was one of the foremost Welsh language authors of the twentieth century.
Known as Brenhines ein llên ("The queen of our literature"), it was the death of her brother during World War I, that inspired Roberts to start writing, using it as a means of coming to terms with her loss. Her work mainly deals with how ordinary people overcome life's problems and disappointments. Roberts was also a prominent Welsh nationalist and was an early member of Plaid Cymru.
RAF Valley in Anglesey opened on 13th February 1941, with the task of providing defence cover for England's industrial north-west and shipping in the Irish Sea.
Royal Air Force Station Valley provides fast-jet training for jet planes and aircrew working with search and rescue. It is also used as Anglesey Airport.
Born on this day 1993 in Tonypandy.
Sophie Evans - Singer and actress who gained wide public notice as being the runner-up on the 2010 BBC talent show "Over the Rainbow", with its chief judge being Andrew Lloyd Webber. She went on to play Dorothy in Lloyd Webber's West End production of "The Wizard of Oz".
Address: 116 Santa Monica Boulevard, Santa Monica, CA 90401
Telephone: (310) 451-1402
Fax: (310) 393-6869
Email: contact@yeoldekingshead.com
How they celebrate St Davids Day in the USA and Canada
By Roy Norry:
"I n Wales we wear the daffodil to mark St Davids Day and we hold services and events, but not many realise that in America and Canada, ex-pats have lined up events in many regions and there are some great ideas amongst them."
read more here;- St David's Day USA
On 12th February 2007, a report by the National Trust revealed that more than 70% of the coastline in Wales is under threat from coastal erosion and flooding. The report, Shifting Shores, stated that the massive likely impact of global warming on the shape of Wales is that our coastline will be transformed beyond recognition if climate change is not halted.
However broadcaster and environmental campaigner, David Bellamy believes that to state that global warming is caused by man, is poppycock and that climate change is historically proved to run in cycles.
Born this day 1371, in Usk.
Elizabeth Mortimer, who was the great-granddaughter of Edward III. She is best known for her marriage to her first husband Sir Henry Percy (Hotspur), when she was eight and he fifteen.
Hotspur, one-time ally of Owain Glyndwr was killed at the Battle of Shrewsbury in 1403 fighting Edward IV, who had Hotspur's body quartered and delivered to Elizabeth, who had him buried in York Minster. Jane Seymour, Queen consort of Henry VII, was a descendant of Elizabeth and Elizabeth is represented as 'Kate, Lady Percy,' in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1 and as 'Widow Percy' in Henry IV, Part 2.
Born this day 1843, in Llanelli
John Graham Chambers, who was a sportsman and newspaper editor, who devised the Queensbury Rules in 1865, which is a code of generally accepted rules in the sport of boxing that were publicly endorsed by John Douglas, 9th Marquess of Queensbury.
Born this day 1978, in Cardiff
Gethin Jones , television presenter, best known as a presenter on Blue Peter and Daybreak.
Born on this day 1788 in Llanpumsaint, Carmarthenshire.
William Williams - who was the MP whose speech on 10th March 1846 expressing his concerns as the state of education in Wales unwittingly culminated in the "Treachery of the Blue Books" and a furious backlash on himself personally.
In 1804 as a youth of sixteen and having had only a basic education, Williams set out from Carmarthenshire to seek his fortune in London. He began working in a cotton warehouse and soon built up his own business. He was elected MP for Coventry in 1835 and after losing the seat in 1847, he became MP for Lambeth in 1850.
Although he spent the whole of his adult life in England, he never forgot Wales or his native language. He deeply resented the squalid social conditions most of his compatriots were obliged to suffer and believed that if given education, the position of the masses in Wales would improve. It was this conviction that led him to persuade the Government to set up an inquiry into the state of education in Wales. However, the storm of controversy that followed was something that neither he nor anybody else could foresee.
William Williams was a generous benefactor to the village of his birth, paying for the building of a school in 1862. Then in 1863, he chaired the meeting that was instrumental in establishing a campaign for a University of Wales. William Williams died on 26 April 1865, after falling from his horse in Hyde Park, London.
Born on this day 1848 in Nant y glo, near Ebbw Vale.
Beriah Gwynfe Evans - journalist, Congregationalist, dramatist, Liberal politician, Welsh Nationalist and a member of the Gorsedd.
Initially, a teacher, in 1891, Evans switched to a career in journalism with the South Wales Daily News in Cardiff, whilst also editing Welsh items in the South Wales Weekly News and the Cardiff Times. In 1892, he moved to Caernarfon to become managing editor of the Welsh National Press Co and in 1917 he became editor of the Congregationalist weekly Y Tyst.
Politically, Beriah Evans was an ally of David Lloyd George, an active member of Cymru Fydd and in his final years, joined the newly formed Plaid Cymru.
HOW OFTEN ARE YOU WELSH??
Lets show our HWYL on St. Davids Day at Mohegan Sun Arena in Wilkes-Barre, Friday, March 1 st where we will be celebrating Welsh Heritage Night sponsored by the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins Ice Hockey Team and The Welsh Cultural Endeavor of Northeastern Pennsylvania .
~You wont want to miss this first ever-held AHL event ~
Welsh Heritage Night On Ice With The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins
Our rousing Penguins will host esteemed rivals the Hershey Bears at 7:05 PM. This will be a fundraiser for the benefit of future Welsh events where we Welsh will receive $4 for each ticket sold. The added benefit to you will be a free voucher for a hotdog, bag of chips, soda, and an official Penguins hat. This is a win-win for everyone, but you must call and order your tickets from Chris Sipsky at 570-970-3607 to get this deal, and mention the Welsh event. Tickets are selling fast so dont wait! Prices are $18 - $21 - $23.
