ABERTILLERY & DISTRICT MUSEUM SOCIETY

NEWSLETTER April 2007

Annual subscription – this was due on 1^st January so if you haven’t paid your £5 please renew your membership at the lecture or Museum (or post a cheque to the Museum).

Museum opening times
The Museum is open to the public, free of charge:
Monday - Thurs 10am - 1pm     2pm - 4pm
Friday                 10am - 1pm
Saturday             10am - 1pm
Museum phone number 01495 211140. Visitors and volunteers are always welcome so please call in as often as you like.

Contact Names
Mrs Peggy Bearcroft,       Chairperson                      01495 213806
Mr DonBearcroft,       Curator                                     01495 213806 
Mr Ron Selway,         Vice Chairman                          01495 215775
Mr Trevor Cook Secretary- c/o Museum                 01495 211140
Mrs Margaret Cook  Assistant Secretary
Mr Bernard Jones, Treasurer                                     01495 213185  
Mrs Enid Dean, Fund raising Secretary                   01495 212880 
Mrs M Gilson, Schools Liaison                                01495 212413    
Mrs M Selway, Programme Sec                                01495 211960
Mr Roy Pickford, Social Events Sec                        01495 213377
Mr Bernard Hill, Asst Curator                                  01495 212864 
Mrs Jen Price (Newsletter)                                        01633 482851

Fundraising March– £154

 100 Club March winners

1^st         No.114   Doris Churchill            £25
2^nd        No.7       Roy Pickford              £10
3^rd        No.17     Bill Tingle                     £5

Vice Presidents
Mr Keith Dykes                         Mr Alan Hunt
Mrs Esme Heal                          Mr Glyn Saunders 
Mrs Kathleen Davies                 Rev. R Watson
Mrs Margaret Herbert               Prof.Gerwyn Griffiths       
Mr David Llewellyn                   Mrs Carole Brooks
Mr Edward Meredith (dec'd) 
Mrs Jeanette Fulton                   Mr Arthur Lewis OBE

(Annual Subscription £25)

Diary Dates

Wednesday 4^th April 2007 – Quakers in Monmouthshire by John Evans

Wednesday 2^nd May – The Crawshays of Cyfarthfa Castle by Scott Reid.

Saturday 26^th May – trip to Warwick Castle

The lectures are now held in the Metropole Theatre, starting at 7.00pm, with tea and coffee and a chance to chat downstairs in the Museum after each lecture. Entry is £2 and the public are most welcome. Copies of the Newsletter and details of coffee mornings and other events can be found on the notice board at the Museum or at

www.cwmtillery.com

Spring Trip – Saturday 26^th May, trip to Warwick Castle, cost £16.50 including entry and bus fare. Please contact Roy Pickford on 01495 213377 for details and to book your place. Booking closes 30^th April.

You may wish to note the following events upstairs in the Metropole:

Tea Dances on 27th April, 25th May, 29th June, 27th July from 1.30pm - 3.30pm;  Art for All 10am - 4pm on 7th May, 2007;  Music, Music, Music 10am - 4pm, 28th May to 1st June;  Forgotten Skills and Crafts  10am – 4pm, 16th and 17th June.
Phone number for queries and prices for Metropole events - 01495 322510

Tools for Self Reliance     This charity collects and refurbishes unwanted tools and prepares packs for people in African countries to set up their own small businesses as mechanics, bicycle repairers, seamstresses etc.  The charity is now looking for anvils to put together blacksmith kits.  If you can help please contact them on 023 8086 9697.

Condolences    Our deepest sympathy is extended to Corinne and John Taylor (long standing supporters of the Museum) in the sad loss of their daughter Debbie.

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ABERTILLERY & DISTRICT MUSEUM SOCIETY

‘Cartref’ Many of you will doubtless remember the little newspaper which was produced for local members of the armed forces during the war.  This is an extract from the edition dated September 1944, sent to us by Marie Carter.

Abertillery’s Black-out Goes

In common with the rest of the country, Abertillery has doffed (partially at least) the funereal habit it has worn for five years.  The main streets are gay with light, though some unrest has been caused by the lack of illumination in certain spots of the town.   However, we have been promised light even in these dark places, and until we get it we can pilgrimage to these corners of gloom if we feel in need of a throw-back to the bad old days.  But gone are the nights of stumbling down Church Street, in search of a beer, sliding off pavements and apologising to lamposts for bumping into them.  Gone also is the feeling of adventure one experienced.  To leave the house after dark was to venture into a strange and fearful world, a world of fantasy in which queer shapes loomed up and muttered by.  It would be ungrateful of us to allow the nights which brought us wonder and a little fear to pass without a measure of regret.  And we are not an ungrateful people.

More next month.

The Big Freeze of 1947 – last month’s mention of that exceptional winter prompted the following memory from Mr Arthur Lewis:

 Thanks to the good offices of Headmaster William J Robins of the Mining and Technical Institute of Abertillery, I was studying for a Degree in Mining at Cardiff University from 1946 to 1949.

 Our department was housed in Nissen huts near the terminus of the Blackwood to Cardiff, Western Welsh bus service, my usual weekend route to and from Llanhilleth.

 During the 1947 term on a fine day in Cardiff we had news of serious snow conditions in the valleys and food shortages.

 I collected a ½ cwt sack of potatoes at Cardiff Market, entrained at Cardiff Central, changed at Newport for the valley train but was stopped at Crumlin with no further transport due to heavy snowfalls.  Walking from Crumlin to Railway Street, Llanhilleth dragging a sack of potatoes along the main valley road in snow, feet deep was a heavy exhausting task not to be forgotten

The BBC featured a letter from a former resident – John Lamacraft -of Ebbw Vale who said:

I too remember the blizzard of 1947 …nothing moved for days, snow in our street in Ebbw Vale was up to the bedroom windows, of course that was drifting.  Those who died in some homes on the mountainside were wrapped in blankets and put out in the snow until they could be formally buried after retrieval when the snow melted.  My father was a railwayman, and was so busy we did not see him for four days, he was helping organise the usage of an aircraft jet engine from St Athan to be mounted on a flat car to blow the exhaust into the snow on the railway for clearance, thus allowing trains with food to traverse the valley.

Poet’s Corner

REMAINS

Sun lights scars from limestone
quarrying, on Llangattock Mountain,
Walkers tread old tramways,
cyclists ride along tarmac laid
where rails carried wagons

Climbers train for their sport
on manmade cliffs, from where
can be viewed Crickhowell,
Beacon Mountains and River Usk.

Historians look and marvel
so little remains to show where
thousands toiled creating an
industrial empire, under a
cruel dispassionate system.

Industry has moved on,
to scar and pollute another land,
Leaving peaceful beauty, barely
penetrated by bleating sheep
barking dog or human voice.

Wild life abounds again,
All appreciated by visitors,
none of whom are likely
to mourn for the demise
of  yesterday’s industry.

                        Gordon Rowlands, Sept. 2006

Jam journey - Regulars to the Museum will know that Enid Dean’s home-made jam is a winner.  Several jars are now on their way rather further afield – to Bosnia no less!

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ABERTILLERY & DISTRICT MUSEUM SOCIETY

Local Voices

Mr Arthur Lewis OBE is writing his autobiography; here is an extract.

Lather boy.

Having moved from Crumlin back to No 52 Railway St, when I was eight years old my mother took me to see Mr Purchase, a barber who offered his services from my sister Florence’s (Florrie) front room in No. 25, with a barber’s pole prominent outside.  My mother asked the barber to employ me as a lather boy on Friday after school and all day on a Saturday, for two shillings and six pence.   I worked with Mr Purchase for a couple of years until he died, then worked for a new barber until I was 14 yrs of age and went to work underground.

After Mr Purchase’s death I worked for another barber Mr Dai Pound who lived in Commercial Rd., Llanhilleth.  Mr Pound worked as a coalminer on the nightshift in Crumlin as well as a barber in the evenings during the week and all day on Saturdays.  His shop was in the front room of a house in Woodland Terrace occupied by the Norris family.

This end terrace house was some 30yds from the main road through Llanhilleth immediately opposite the main entrance to St. Marks Church.  My new employment involved working Monday, Tuesday and Thursday evenings as well.  I used to hurry from Tyr Graig and later Brynhyffryd schools to work.

A new addition to my employment was to lather men in their beds at Aberbeeg Hospital.

The new work involved walking some 2 miles uphill to be at the hospital by 7a.m. twice a week, meeting the barber who travelled by railway train from Crumlin to Aberbeeg.  For this new job I was paid 3d or 6d according to the number of men lathered.  While lathering one patient I was asked how old I was, I replied 101/2 yrs .The man then stated, ‘my name is Phillips I am the Math’s teacher at Brynhyffryd School and when you are 11yrs old you will move there from Tyr Graig, and if you are late it means you will be caned’.   

William Wilberforce 1799-1833

The history of Britain has seen many periods of horrendous persecution such as the religious persecution under Mary 1^st, the dissolution of the monasteries and the barbaric acts in the reign of Henry VIIIth and the civil war and execution of Charles 1^st.  However, perhaps the most prolonged inhuman action by the British Empire was the slave trade in black Africans.
Estimates of the number of black people transported across the Atlantic vary from 15 to 30 million.  They were shackled, beaten, starved and made to endure the utmost degradation imaginable.
They were treated like animals and one historian quotes a white slave owner as actually saying they were no better intellectually than orang-utans.
As the bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade is commemorated, we pay tribute to William Wilberforce.  He began his verbal attacks on slavery while still at school and from 1788 devoted himself to its abolition.  He worked tirelessly to secure the abolition of the slave trade in 1807 and of slavery itself in 1833.
We must not forget that the slaves also tried to redress their plight.  There are records of revolts and uprisings by the slaves themselves.  There were shipboard rebellions, and revolts by the slaves in Jamaica, Barbados and St Dominique.

Enid Dean

Weekly Argus Saturday 16^th July1938

The Miner and the Future

“The creation of the Miners’ Welfare Fund marked one of the biggest advances in social relationships experienced in the industrial history of this country.  By a levy on the coalowners of one half-penny a ton of coal produced, and a levy of one shilling in the pound on mining royalties, a fund of over £16,500,000 has been built up since 1920 and expended in the interests of those employed in the mining industry.  That is an achievement of which everyone associated with the effort can feel justly proud.  Pithead baths, convalescent homes, hospitals, sports grounds for workmen and playgrounds for children, clubs, institutes, swimming pools, scholarships, lectures and research into health and safety measures are among the amenities provided from this fund.  The benefits derived are almost beyond computation.”

Thanks to Miss J Karn of Tredegar Library.

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ABERTILLERY & DISTRICT MUSEUM SOCIETY

Museum Matters

With the new legislation regarding the use of tobacco smoking it is interesting to look at the origins and the beliefs of this plant. Before 1 BC Historians believe Native Americans began using tobacco for medicinal and ceremonial purposes. Their cure for gout is as follows.

One with gout can be cured in this way: the bush piltzin-tecouh-xochitl, the cypress and laurel, are thrown in an ants' ditch where ants go to and fro, or sprinkled as a lotion. Then the leaves of the bush quappo-quietl (Nitotianas) and bark of the ayanh-qushuitl, leaves of the quetzal-mizquitl, tlaq-que-q tepe-chian, the flowers of any plant, a small white or red stone, the plant capali, pine, an oyster shell ground up in hare's blood, small foxes, serpentine for burrowing moles), eca-cohuatl, lizards; pearl, greenstone and bloodstone ground up in water. If the foot is troubled with much heat, let it be soaked in liquor, if it is chilled over the instep, it is to be heated. To the above named a yellow colored flint, and the flesh and excrement of a fox, which you must crisp. (It cured the gout but your foot or leg dropped off!)

600-1000 AD the first pictorial record of tobacco being smoked was found on Guatemalan pottery. In 1492 Columbus discovered tobacco in the New World. He is offered "certain dried leaves" which, he records in his journal, "gave off a distinct fragrance".
After the Spanish explorer Rodrigo de Jerez observed smoking he became a smoker he took the habit back to Spain. In 1572 Sir Francis Drake returned from the Americas and introduced pipe smoking to Britain. Tobacco was recommended for toothache, falling fingernails, worms, halitosis, lockjaw and cancer!
In 1585 Sir Francis Drake introduces smoking to Sir Walter Raleigh. Some of the Virginia colonists return to England smoking pipes. The habit quickly spreads and tobacco takes root in English society.
The Popes banned smoking in holy places. Sir Walter Raleigh persuades Queen Elizabeth to try smoking. (Have A Drag)
King James I of England, in his "counterblaste to Tobacco", said that smoking is a "custome lothesome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black and stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the horrible stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless". He was the first to impose a heavy tax on tobacco.
King Philip II of Spain established Seville as world centre for the production of cigars. European cigarette use begins here as beggars patch together tobacco from used cigars and roll them in paper.
1660 The restoration of the monarchy: Charles II returns from exile in Paris bringing the French court's practice of snuff with him. Snuff becomes an aristocratic form of tobacco use. (It also became popular with South Wales Miners)

1665.  Samuel Pepys describes a Royal Society experiment in which a cat quickly dies after being fed "a drop of distilled oil of tobacco".
1693       Smoking is banned in the House of Commons chamber: "No Member do presume to take tobacco in the gallery of the House or at a committee table."
1724       Pope Benedict XIII learns to smoke and repeals Papal Bulls against clerical smoking. ( He also took a drag) 1753 Swedish botanist Carolus Linnaeus names the plant genus, nicotiana, and describes two species: nicotiana rustica, and nicotiana tabacum.
1791       John Hill reports cases in which snuff caused nasal cancers.
1826 Cigar smoking begins to become fashionable in England.
1830s an anti-tobacco movement begins as an adjunct to the temperance movement. In 1832 Egyptian soldiers are credited with the invention of the modern cigarette and in 1847 Philip Morris opens a shop in Bond Street, London, selling hand-rolled Turkish cigarettes. 1852 Matches were introduced, making smoking more convenient. 1853-1856 During Crimean War British soldiers learned how cheap and convenient the cigarettes used by their Turkish allies are and bring the practice back to England. The first cigarette factory in Britain was opened by Crimean War veteran Robert Gloag. In 1868 UK
Parliament passes the Railway Bill which mandates smoke-free carriages to prevent injury to non-smokers. 1876 Benson & Hedges receives its first royal warrant from Edward, Prince of Wales. 1908 Children's Act bans the sale of tobacco to children under 16. 1912 Dr I Adler is the first to suggest that lung cancer is related to smoking. Cigarette smoking becomes widespread among soldiers as tobacco is included in army rations during the First World War. Until the 1920's women who smoked were considered to have dubious morals. Leading companies begin the pursuit of female smokers.  Marlboro ad "Has smoking any more to do with a woman's morals than has the color of her hair?" slogans, "Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet". Chesterfield: "Just as pure as the water you drink .and practically untouched by human hands."
The Children's Act is repealed and replaced by the Children and Young Persons Act. Under Section 7 of the Act it was made illegal to sell cigarettes to children under 16.
During WW II as part of the war effort, President Roosevelt makes tobacco a protected crop. Cigarettes are included in soldiers' rations. Tobacco companies send millions of free cigarettes to troops.  A massive (43%) increase in cigarette tax results in a 14% drop in cigarette consumption among British men. in 1953 Dr Ernst L Wynder"s landmark report finds that painting cigarette tar on the backs of mice creates tumours. This is the first biological link between smoking and cancer.
 We have a good collection of artefacts regarding tobacco and its uses but now is the time to add to the collection by donating unwanted unique items to the museum.
Don Bearcroft Curator.