HistoryPoints News

Conwy sea air for city kids

Mar 28, 2024

After Manchester GP Dr Thomas Garrett moved to Conwy in 1916, it wasn't only his health that benefited. He and wife Catherine set aside rooms in their seaside house for children to escape temporarily from the polluted ...

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QR codes explain Preseli-Stonehenge link

Mar 21, 2024

New HistoryPoints QR codes in the Preseli mountains explain how the quarries which produced the bluestones found at Stonehenge form part of a rich legacy of prehistoric remnants in the uplands. At one Neolithic quarry ...

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Consecrated concrete in Amlwch

Mar 13, 2024

Visitors to Amlwch, Anglesey, are intrigued by the Catholic church whose concrete nave echoes the form of an upturned boat. Now there are HistoryPoints QR codes at the churchyard entrance so that anyone can discover ...

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Cwmbrân's groovy tunnel

Mar 7, 2024

At the sides of old canals, it's not uncommon to see grooves carved by ropes where horses drew boats around bends, but at Cwmbrân Tunnel the grooves are above the water! Use your smartphone to scan the HistoryPoints QR codes beside ...

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Neath's narrow workhouse

Feb 28, 2024

Social reformer Joseph Rowntree visited many institutions but none prepared him for the cramped and "manifestly unsuitable" site of Neath workhouse. If you scan the HistoryPoints QR codes at the building, you'll see how ...

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Facing down an anti-Irish mob

Feb 22, 2024

An anti-Irish mob which rampaged through Holyhead in 1851 picked the wrong target when it reached the shop and home of James Nugent. He refused to discharge his Irish employees, despite the mob's threat to ...

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Prestatyn grave stories

Feb 16, 2024

The stories of a talented young photographer who died covering the Romanian revolution in 1998, a woman who survived a lightning strike on her shop, an archdruid, and six children who drowned together are now available on your smartphone ...

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A real Shambles in Monmouth

Feb 8, 2024

Many people who walk or drive along Monmouth's Priory Street may be unaware that countless animals were slaughtered beneath the road. Now you can scan HistoryPoints QR codes in the street to discover the story of the 1830s Shambles, where ...

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Unknown Warrior coffin's Welsh ironwork

Jan 31, 2024

Master ironworker DJ Williams of Caernarfon was summoned to London on 1 November 1920. There he was told that he had just six days to make all of the handles and straps for the coffin of the Unknown Warrior, due to be buried ceremonially ...

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Vicar's slavery windfall

Jan 24, 2024

While Rev George Warrington was vicar of Hope, Flintshire, he and his wife Mary owned the Pantre Pant sugar estate in Jamaica. The estate included more than 100 slaves. The couple received more than £3,000 when they sold the estate c.1790. For ...

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Cardiff's bath feeder canal

Jan 18, 2024

The feeder canal which flows through Cardiff city centre didn't only keep the docks topped up - it also supplied the public baths at the south end of what's now Churchill Way. The baths opened in 1862, after improved sewage systems took the smelliest ...

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Garden visited by royals

Jan 9, 2024

The Wales Coast Path runs past the perimeter fence of Cestyll Garden, on Anglesey's north coast, but walkers haven't been given on-the-spot information about it until now. HistoryPoints QR codes at the WCP gate just outside the garden reveal how British and Russian royalty ...

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When soldiers heckled clowns

Dec 31, 2023

Will Catlin's famous pierrot clowns were a big attraction on Colwyn Bay seafront, but one performance in 1915 was interrupted by locally-billeted soldiers from South Wales who asked why the performers hadn't joined the army. Around 7,000 soldiers and civilians massed there the next ...

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Monmouth nurse's Christmas party tragedy

Dec 24, 2023

Nurse Caroline Maud Edwards wasted no time joining the Royal Naval Nursing Service when the First World War began. Her parents had settled in Monmouth after returning to Wales from the USA. On 30 December 1915 she attended Christmas ...

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River Taff's body catcher

Dec 19, 2023

Radyr weir, north of Cardiff, was built in the 1770s to supply water to a tinplate works but it also played a gruesome second role: intercepting the bodies of people who had drowned further up the Taff or in its tributaries. Now you can use the HistoryPoints QR codes on a fencepost ...

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Nye's Beaumaris inspiration

Dec 9, 2023

As well as founding the NHS, Aneurin ('Nye') Bevan improved housing standards for working people. Now you can scan HistoryPoints QR codes at the Cae Bricks housing estate in Beaumaris to discover how he was so impressed with the architecture ...

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Aber's old lifeboat station

Dec 2, 2023

Aberystwyth's lifeboat station is obvious to visitors and residents, thanks to its harbour-side location. Its Victorian predecessor is more obscure - well away from the sea. Now our QR codes on that building, in Queen's Road, enable anyone to discover its ...

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Abertillery couple's train plunge

Nov 25, 2023

After visiting the Shrewsbury Flower Show in 1910, the train journey home came to a sudden and shocking end for Giovanni Tedaldi - one of a succession of Italians who ran the cafe in Abertillery Arcade - and his wife Mary. In darkness, the train ...

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Marconi's Tywyn bungalows

Nov 18, 2023

The 'Marconi Bungalows' street sign beside the A493 in Tywyn is a reminder of the area's importance in the First World War. Now you can use HistoryPoints QR codes at the sign to discover how wireless pioneer Guglielmo Marconi ...

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Enlightenment in Carmarthenshire

Nov 11, 2023

During Europe's 'Age of Enlightenment' in the 18th century, a chain of events in Carmarthenshire sparked a revolution in rural schooling which rapidly made Wales one of Europe's most literate nations. Now you can scan HistoryPoints QR codes at ...

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Dinas Powys WREN remembered

Nov 3, 2023

Teenager Mary Cooke worked for a fur coat company, sometimes modelling coats, before the Second World War shattered her family's happiness. One night a bomb dropped near the family's garden in Dinas Powys, wrecking the ...

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Eeriness on the coast path

Oct 26, 2023

You won't find anywhere more eerie along the Wales Coast Path than the towering mausoleum, in woodland near Bangor, of the family which owned the huge Dinorwig slate quarry. For the first time, information about the building is now available ...

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Cardiff park's Roman villa

Oct 17, 2023

Trelai Park in Ely, Cardiff, may look like an ordinary park as you enter, but if you scan the new HistoryPoints QR codes at the entrances you can read about the Roman buildings which stood there, including a villa, and see a photo of a mortarium ...

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Rhos-on-Sea’s ‘charming’ estate

Oct 8, 2023

The great American architect Frank Lloyd Wright declared a post-war housing estate in Rhos-on-Sea “perfectly charming” when he visited in 1956 with his friend Sir Clough Williams-Ellis, of Portmeirion fame. The attention to detail is still obvious today, including the figurines from children’s ...

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Aberystwyth’s phoenix from ashes

Oct 3, 2023

Demolition beckoned after Aberystwyth’s old town hall, dating from the 1840s, was badly damaged by fire in 1957. But noted architect Sidney Colwyn Foulkes was brought in, and you can now use your smartphone to compare his …

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Anti-vaxxers in 1876

Sep 25, 2023

During a smallpox outbreak in the Cwmbrân area in 1876, several parents were charged with not allowing the local doctor to vaccinate their children at his home, Cwmbrân House. One mother said the house, at Five Locks, was too far from the family home …

 

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Death at the Llangollen Canal

Sep 16, 2023

As you visit the peaceful, wooded setting of the Llangollen Canal at Pentrefelin you can now scan HistoryPoints QR codes to discover how the wharf there was still in industrial use when one of its cranes collapsed in 1877. The crane was loading slate slabs ...

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Wales' oddest footpath name

Sep 9, 2023

Fortune's Frolic is the puzzling name of a riverside footpath in Haverfordwest. Now you can scan HistoryPoints QR codes there to discover how a man named Samuel Fortune was found in scandalous circumstances on the path and challenged to a duel, in ...

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Brynmawr's pioneering factory

Sep 1, 2023

The rubber factory built in deprived Brynmawr after the Second World War was a showpiece of architectural innovation, a precursor to the Sydney Opera House. The boiler house, with its distinctive parabolic walls-to-roof shape, still stands. Now you can ...

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Thomas Charles' story on mobiles

Aug 25, 2023

Rev Thomas Charles (1755-1814) was a key figure in Methodism's rapid growth across Wales, and now you can read his story on your smartphone by scanning HistoryPoints QR codes at four places in North and South Wales. On the Wales Coast Path near St Clears in Carmarthenshire ...

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Train-crash victims' stories

Aug 19, 2023

People often visit the mass grave in Abergele of the 33 who died in the Irish Mail crash on 20 August 1868, but the gravestone only gives a list of names. Now HistoryPoints QR codes reveal the stories of each person who was killed, including ...

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Cardiff steamers recalled

Aug 11, 2023

The disused wooden structures in the water off Mermaid Quay may be a puzzling feature for many Cardiff Bay visitors, but our new QR codes explain how crowds used to board steamers there each summer to cruise to Ilfracombe ...

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Napoleon's Anglesey marble

Aug 4, 2023

The Napoleonic wars aided the Mona Marble quarry at Rhoscolyn, Anglesey, as foreign marble was hard to obtain. The quarry's owner got another boost after Waterloo when he made furniture for Napoleon's home in exile on ...

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St Samson's DIY mishap

Jul 25, 2023

If you've ever hurt yourself doing DIY, spare a thought for Samson, one-time abbot of Caldey Island near Tenby. According to legend, he lost one of his little fingers when he used it to lift the 12-ton capstone of Carreg Samson into place. The burial chamber ...

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QRs reveal Shotton VC's story

Jul 18, 2023

A memorial garden in Shotton, Flintshire, commemorates local man Henry Weale, awarded the Victoria Cross after his heroism in 1918 in clearing out a German machine-gun post, despite his Lewis gun failing. Now QR codes have been ...

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Dock of 7 years' labour

Jul 12, 2023

An unusual section of the Wales Coast Path runs alongside a large rectangular lake in Cardiff, and now walkers can scan HistoryPoints QR codes to discover that this was the Bute East Dock - which took hundreds of men seven years to ...

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Shedding light on broken dam

Jul 6, 2023

The broken dam at Cwm Eigiau, above the Conwy Valley, is a relic of the 1925 disaster which killed 16 local residents. Now visitors to the secluded valley can, for the first time, discover the dam's story as they walk and ...

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Martyrdom in Haverfordwest

Jun 30, 2023

An intriguing memorial in Haverfordwest marks the spot where William Nichol was "burnt at the stake for the truth" in 1558. Now you can use your phone to scan HistoryPoints QR codes nearby to discover he was a "halfe foolish" man who ...

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TS Eliot's 'White Well' located

Jun 25, 2023

The location of the 'White Well' which TS Eliot mentions in his poem Usk was a mystery until 20 years ago, when Prof Philip Edwards pinpointed Ffynnon Gybi, an ancient holy well in Llangybi, Monmouthshire. Now you can ...

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Nantlle's lost lake

Jun 17, 2023

Llyn Nantlle Uchaf (upper Nantlle lake) may strike visitors as an odd name when there's no other lake to be seen, but now HistoryPoints QR codes explain why and when the lower lake disappeared - and how its phantom reappears ...

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Tribute to Pembs energy workers

Jun 7, 2023

In the 10 years since Milford Haven's energy workers' tribute was created, many passers by may not have appreciated the monument's meaning. Now anyone can scan the new HistoryPoints QR codes there to discover what ...

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Making a fast profit in Tenby

May 29, 2023

Evan Jones of Llanelli offered the government £500 for St Catherine's Island, Tenby, and was astonished when his bid was accepted, as the authorities had spent far more on fortifying it. Seven years later, in 1914, Evan sold the island ...

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Coronation contrast in Conwy

May 26, 2023

Our web page about Berry Street, Conwy, has a fascinating photo from Conwy Archives Service of soldiers parading to celebrate the 1937 coronation. The archives service recently collaborated with Conwy Camera Club to ...

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Dinorwig's stubborn pinnacle

May 21, 2023

The volcanic rock pinnacle called Y Ceiliog Mawr ('big cockerel') is a landmark in the vast remnants of Dinorwig slate quarry. Now you can scan our QR codes where the footpath starts descending towards Nant Peris to discover why the Ceilog was a hazard and ...

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Wild west copper mine

May 13, 2023

Anyone walking the coast path at mainland Wales' most westerly point, in Pembrokeshire, may be surprised to find industrial remains at this remote spot. Our new QR codes there explain that not only was this a source of copper ...

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Brecon weir demystified

May 2, 2023

The weir on the Usk on the north-west outskirts of Brecon may be puzzling to many riverside walkers because the abstracted water disappears underground. Now HistoryPoints QR codes explain that the water feeds the canal which terminates c.1km away. This ...

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Betws-y-coed's healthy school

Apr 23, 2023

Our new QR codes by the entrance to Ysgol Betws-y-coed shed light on its origins as an 'open air' school, a German concept brought to North-west Wales in the early 20th century. The big sliding windows along the south elevation ...

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Tenby's Grand National winners

Apr 14, 2023

Tenby residents and visitors can now use their smartphones to discover the connection between former hotel stables and the Rees brothers - who won the Grand National in consecutive years. Our new QR codes at Brychan Yard ...

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Welsh curse was Irish loss

Apr 5, 2023

Pennard Castle, Gower, was overwhelmed by sand after fairies placed a curse on it, and at the same time Ireland's beaches were stripped of their sand. That's one of the myths associated with the ruined castle which you can now ...

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Barmouth's Belgian dragon

Mar 25, 2023

A dragon with a remarkable heritage overlooks Barmouth High Street but few of the town's many visitors notice it or know its story. Now HistoryPoints QR codes below the carving explain the link to Belgian WW1 refugees, one of ...

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Cardiff's own 'Little Ireland'

Mar 19, 2023

Our new QR codes in Tyndall Street, Cardiff, reveal to passers by how the area to the north - now occupied by office blocks - was previously the community known as 'Little Ireland'. The housing, which you can see in an aerial photo when you scan ...

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Rovi the 'Welsh wizard'

Mar 13, 2023

By day Ifor Parry was a printer in Caernarfon, but his magic tricks and unique brand of entertainment took him around the world and earned him the Magic Circle's title 'King of Cards'. Now a slate plaque and accompanying HistoryPoints QR codes have ...

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Brecon-born doctor honoured

Mar 6, 2023

A purple plaque has been unveiled in Brecon town centre marking the birthplace of Frances Hoggan, who became only the second woman in Europe to gain a medical doctorate. You can scan the HistoryPoints QR codes on the Nicholls shop window below ...

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Denbigh's witch-trial venue

Feb 27, 2023

Denbigh's courthouse, now home to the county council's library and one-stop shop, was still new when a weaver and herbal healer named Gwen was sent to the town for trial for witchcraft in 1594, following questioning by the Bishop of St Asaph. After her trial she ...

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North Cardiff's canal traced

Feb 18, 2023

The Glamorganshire Canal through Cardiff's northern suburbs was filled in after WW2 but now you can use your smartphone to see aerial photos of the route and read canal stories. Our new QR codes in Gabalfa and Llandaff North extend our tour along ...

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Wilson's Nantlle view on the spot

Feb 12, 2023

Richard Wilson's painting of the view towards Snowdon from Nantlle in the 1760s is a classic, and now you can enjoy it when you visit his viewpoint - and learn why his landscapes were so influential in the development of British ...

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North-South Wales at glacial speed

Feb 5, 2023

If you think travel between North and South Wales is painfully slow, spare a thought for the Porthlysgi boulder near St Davids. Its mineral composition is alien to Pembrokeshire but matches picrite found on the Llŷn Peninsula and Anglesey. It was transported ...

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QRs for deaf pioneer's story

Jan 28, 2023

Dorothy Miles, a pioneer of sign language in arts, education and broadcasting, died 30 years ago. Now HistoryPoints has placed QR codes outside her childhood home in Rhyl so that anyone can use their smartphone to discover her remarkable ...

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Capel Curig's bounty

Jan 21, 2023

Centuries before the Levelling Up Fund and other grants for under-privileged areas, Queen Anne set up a bounty scheme to enable poor clergymen to receive steady incomes. Capel Curig's churchwardens successfully applied in 1740 and acquired Bryntyrch ...

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Whale-bone cutting in Pembs

Jan 13, 2023

The diary of Abiel Folger, one of the American settlers who developed Milford Haven, records that her husband Timothy cut whale bone in his last years. A relative of Benjamin Franklin, he was a whaling-ship captain but was ostracised in Nantucket for ...

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People power in Abergavenny

Jan 5, 2023

The survival of Abergavenny's large parish church is down to people power - in the 16th century. It belonged to a Benedictine priory but townspeople were already worshipping in part of it before King Henry VIII ordered the ...

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Stunt pilot's story on your mobile

Dec 27, 2022

Idwal Jones of Talysarn, Gwynedd, wowed crowds in the 1930s with aerobatic tricks such as picking a handkerchief off the ground with a wingtip. Now you can read the story of his career and early death when you pass ...

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See flower diary as you walk

Dec 18, 2022

Botanical artist Betty Mills kept an illustrated diary of her walks along a path in Deganwy, near Llandudno, in 1989-90. Now you can use your smartphone to discover her story and view pictures from her diary as ...

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American Quakers' meeting house

Dec 10, 2022

Quaker whaling families who had been edged out of Nantucket, USA, built themselves a meeting house in Milford Haven in 1811. It's still used by Quakers today, and you can now read its fascinating story on your smartphone ...

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Discover Irish-Welsh history

Dec 2, 2022

100 years since the founding of the Irish Free State, we've created a list of the stories we've featured which reflect the many intertwinings of Irish and Welsh history. Click on the link in each entry to see the relevant web page, where you'll ...

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Divorce reformer remembered

Nov 26, 2022

A new purple plaque at Flint town hall honours Eirene White, one of Wales' first three female MPs, and you can scan the nearby HistoryPoints QR codes with your mobile to see photos of her and read ...

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Tenby's giant cistern

Nov 16, 2022

In the centuries when ships sailed to and from Tenby harbour, build-up of sand deposited by each tide would have made the water too shallow were it not for an ingenious flushing system built in the early 17th century. A long wall ...

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Llandaff's war memorial maker

Nov 11, 2022

The years after the First World War were a busy time for sculpting and building company W Clarke of Llandaff as commissions poured in for war memorials. Many of the outdoor memorials in South Wales were crafted by the firm, as ...

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WW1 work at Inigo Jones

Nov 5, 2022

The Inigo Jones works near Penygroes, Gwynedd, is a testament to the versatility of slate, and in the First World War it was entirely occupied with making slate components for military use. That seems not to have cut no ice with the local military ...

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Wartime quilts from Canada

Oct 30, 2022

Among the hundreds of quilts at the Llanidloes headquarters of the Quilt Association are several made by Canadian women in the Second World War to help people whose homes were bombed. The initiative was organised by the ...

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Fishguard's American blaster

Oct 24, 2022

Huge volumes of rock had to be blasted from a hillside to turn Fishguard's natural harbour into a deep water port. The work crawled along until a millionaire American engineer was brought in. He was knocked down by a locomotive in 1902 but luckily ...

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Saved by the bible in Conwy

Oct 17, 2022

Widow Jane Hughes stayed up late, reading her bible, on the night in 1941 when the Luftwaffe bombed Conwy. The upper floor of her home, Bryn Morfa farmhouse, was badly damaged, and that's where she would have been ...

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Brecon's mill of three names

Oct 11, 2022

Our latest QR codes in Brecon reveal that the ancient mill by the river Honddu has collected three names during its centuries of existence, each referring to its geographical location within the town. By scanning the codes in the front window with your ...

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Snowdonia slate industry's cradle

Oct 4, 2022

Many people pass the old Cilgwyn quarry site each year as they follow the Snowdonia Slate Trail, and now they can scan HistoryPoints QR codes to discover that this is probably where the region's vast slate industry had ...

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Mumbles Marble recalled

Sep 27, 2022

Anyone who walks or cycles along the Swansea waterfront path can now discover the story of Mumbles Marble by scanning the new HistoryPoints QR codes near the West Cross Inn. The stone was washed in the stream there, having ...

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From coal to holiday cottages

Sep 20, 2022

The green and tranquil setting of Bonville's Court Country Park, near Saundersfoot, seems an unlikely place to find former colliery buildings, but coal brought to the surface there once powered the Royal Navy and was the ...

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Post Office whistleblowing

Sep 13, 2022

The connection between a shop in Craig-y-Don and Britain's biggest miscarriage of justice is now explained to passers by, thanks to new HistoryPoints QR codes. The St David's Hospice shop was the local post office when Alan Bates, the ...

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Roald Dahl's sticky wicket

Sep 7, 2022

Anyone strolling along Llandaff High Street can now use their smartphone to read how the young Roald Dahl played a trick on a sweetshop owner which caused so much trouble that he was soon moved ...

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Blue lagoon's private railway

Sep 1, 2022

Anyone who visits the 'blue lagoon' at Abereiddi, Pembrokeshire, will realise that a large amount of slate was quarried there, but where did it go? Scan the new HistoryPoints QR codes by the path from the village to the lagoon and you'll discover ...

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Tailor's wrongful internment

Aug 24, 2022

When the First World War began in August 1914, Llandudno tailor Hynek Zaloudek was interned as an enemy alien despite being a native of Bohemia - which was on Britain's side. At the camp in Queensferry, Flintshire, he was surrounded by men of German and ...

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Follow our ‘Textiles’ thread

Aug 13, 2022

Textiles were a mainstay of the Welsh economy for centuries, and now you can discover many of the industry’s stories by scanning our QR codes at relevant sites. We’ve also listed the locations on this web page so that …

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Britain's last invasion

Aug 7, 2022

Some walkers may be surprised that our new QR codes on the Wales Coast Path west of Fishguard mark the site of the last invasion of Britain. England's south coast was too well defended in 1797 but by choosing Fishguard the French commanders reckoned without Jemima Nicholas and her pitchfork ...

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Shedding light on chapel ruin

Aug 2, 2022

The ruined chapel beside the footpath in Cwmorthin, near Blaenau Ffestiniog, has featured in countless photos but many visitors have been puzzled by its isolated position. Now you can use your smartphone to scan our QR codes on the ...

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Cardiff's Empire Games legacy

Jul 28, 2022

The start of the Commonwealth Games will remind older Cardiffians of the city's hosting of the equivalent event in 1958. Many others associate the 1958 games with one of its legacies - the Empire Pool. The modernist building was a city-centre landmark until its demolition in ...

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Big wigs in Abergavenny

Jul 23, 2022

Wigs with curls down to the shoulders were still fashionable for men in the 18th century, when James Jones ran a business in Abergavenny which bleached goat hair for the town's wig-making industry. It all started with the king of France's hair loss when ...

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Dreaded drought on the Dee

Jul 17, 2022

The dry summer of 1868 damaged industrial production in North Wales, including at the Pentrefelin slate slab works, near Llangollen. There wasn't enough water in the river Dee to power the various mills in the area which still ...

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Onion argy-bargy at Old Quay

Jul 12, 2022

The river in Haverfordwest is so shallow today it's hard to picture vessels tying up at Old Quay, but onion ships from Brittany were still a seasonal sight there in the last century. In 1907 two onion ships arrived at the same time, sparking a fight between ...

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Bard's inspirational cottage

Jul 5, 2022

Many coast-path walkers pass the ruins of Tŷ Tan yr Allt, near Aberdaron, every year but few have known of its connection with one of Cynan's most famous poems - until now. HistoryPoints QR codes displayed nearby enable anyone to use their smartphone ...

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Happy hunting at Burry Holms

Jun 28, 2022

Burry Holms is a small tidal island off the western tip of the Gower peninsula, so why have archaeologists found so many Mesolithic hunting tools there? The answer lies in the local topography in the millennia after the last Ice Age, when ...

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Horseplay at Horseshoe Falls

Jun 21, 2022

Llangollen's Victorian residents were proud of the beautiful Horseshoe Falls on the Dee but annoyed by visitors who would foolishly walk out from the riverbank along a narrow timber, designed to deflect floating debris away from ...

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Fear of children in Pontcanna

Jun 14, 2022

When the Bute Estate created Plasturton Gardens in a new suburb of Cardiff in 1890, residents feared that large areas of grass would encourage misbehaviour by children. So great were their concerns that they funded ...

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Swansea's waterfront railway

Jun 5, 2022

As you enjoy the foot and cycle path along Swansea's waterfront, it's hard to imagine full-size trains thundering along that very route. Now you can scan our QR codes by the path at Black Pill to see on your smartphone photos of steam ...

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QRs on Snowdonia Slate Trail

May 31, 2022

The Snowdonia Slate Trail takes in some of the national park's less-frequented areas, including abandoned quarries and sinuous narrow-gauge railway routes. Now you can use our QR codes along the route to discover ...

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Prichard's folly fully used

May 22, 2022

Architect John Prichard died in 1886 while his grand new house in Llandaff was half-built, so the roofless structure got the nickname "Prichard's folly". After 20 years, though, it was incorporated into the new premises of St Michael's Theological ...

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HistoryPoints website update

May 16, 2022

Regular readers may notice that our website has been updated. The main difference is that our pages now load in a more convenient format on smartphones. On desktops or laptops the menu continues to appear on the left, while on ...

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Pupil punishes teacher in Dinorwig

May 12, 2022

A teacher at the British School in Dinorwig got more than he bargained for when he took part in a snowball fight between boys from two villages. A past pupil recalled in 1918 that the teacher had started to beat him as punishment for another boy's foul ...

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Antiquities at Eglwys Gymyn

May 6, 2022

A visit to Eglwys Gymyn, near Pendine, Carmarthenshire, is like stepping back into early Christianity, and now you can scan HistoryPoints QR codes at the churchyard entrance for a handy guide to such features as a stone inscribed with Ogham and Latin, an ...

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Virtual tram rides at Llandudno

Apr 29, 2022

A ride on the coastal tramway from Llandudno to Colwyn Bay was a holiday highlight before the system closed in 1956, but now you can use your smartphone and QR codes at 18 places along the route to see photos of the ...

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A lucky mistake near Solva

Apr 21, 2022

Navigational errors in boats were often unlucky - but not for palaeontologist John Salter in 1862. Making a wrong turn on the approach to Solva, Pembrokeshire, led him to identify fossils of a giant type of trilobite which he later got to name. For ...

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All aboard the Titanic in Llangollen

Apr 15, 2022

Horse-drawn boat rides on the Llangollen Canal were so popular by 1910 that the proprietor bought larger vessels which carried the names of ocean liners. He named one of them 'Titanic' after the huge liner then ...

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A night in a bucket in Snowdonia

Apr 8, 2022

A quarryman who hitched a cheeky ride home on an industrial aerial ropeway in 1908 got more than he bargained for when a hooter sounded the end of work and the power was switched off. The ropeway ...

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Gerald of Wales' tour on mobiles

Apr 3, 2022

It was over Easter 1188 that Gerallt Gymro accompanied the Archbishop of Canterbury around Wales to recruit thousands of crusaders. His journal provides a fascinating historical insight. Now you can follow his route using your smartphone and our QR codes ...

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10 years of instant history

Mar 26, 2022

Shortly before the 2012 Easter holidays, HistoryPoints put its first set of QR codes on display in Conwy, Deganwy and Llandudno Junction so that anyone could use emerging smartphone technology to receive ...

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To Russia with love

Mar 19, 2022

When the Nazis occupied western Russia in the 1940s, thousands of British sailors lost their lives on the Arctic Convoys which kept Russia supplied with millions of tonnes of vital equipment. Now the Merchant Navy Association has placed HistoryPoints QR codes on ...

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Milling below Aber falls

Mar 12, 2022

Thousands of people walk to the spectacular Abergwyngregyn falls, near Bangor, every year but few probably realise that the same water used to power a mill which still stands in the nearby village. Now you can use your smartphone to view two of the pictures of the mill which artists ...

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Location learning in Laugharne

Mar 5, 2022

Young residents of Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, need to know their local geography better than most, to avoid being stumped during the three-yearly Common Walk around the boundary of the Laugharne lordship. The 37km walk is a 700-year-old tradition. Any ...

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Fisherman's ironic boat death

Feb 26, 2022

Like many fishermen over the years, John Roberts died in a boat accident. What makes his death in 1903 unusual or unique is that the boat in question was a swingboat at Menai Bridge fair. He died two days after falling out of the ride. The fair was a ...

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Abergavenny's black clock face

Feb 19, 2022

The prominent town clock above Abergavenny's market hall was a gift from wealthy industrialist Crawshay Bailey, aka the "iron king", who lived in nearby Maindiff Court. He died in 1872, shortly before the building was finished, and ...

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Hear composer's song by her house

Feb 12, 2022

Of Dilys Elwyn Edwards' many songs, Mae Hiraeth yn y Môr is the best known - and now you can listen to it and read her story on your mobile as you pass the bungalow where she lived in Caernarfon. Having studied with Herbert Howells, she became a piano ...

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Rocks of the world unite in Cardiff

Feb 5, 2022

Local quarries couldn't keep up with the demand for stone when Cardiff was a fast-growing port, but ships arriving from around the world to load up with coal brought a ready solution. Clean ballast - rock loaded for stability before the empty voyage to Cardiff - was ...

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Off-quay at Laugharne port

Jan 29, 2022

Despite being a busy port, Laugharne in Carmarthenshire never had a formal quay. The upshot was that ships were grounded on the mud for coal and other cargo to be loaded by basket into carts or even wheelbarrows. It was a slow and unpleasant job, as you can read on our ...

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Female visitor's quarry death

Jan 22, 2022

Very few women died in Wales' extensive quarries but the Dinorwig slate quarry was so vast and spectacular that it attracted many visitors, including royalty. In 1853 farm servant Catherine Williams was viewing the quarry with two other women when a piece of rock ...

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Miners' medics before the NHS

Jan 15, 2022

As healthcare professionals continue to work flat out to protect us from coronavirus, new QR codes at the site of the Miners' Hospital in Caerphilly are a reminder of how workers or communities organised their own medical ...

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Bullets to bikes in Wrexham

Jan 8, 2022

Hundreds of women made munitions at the Powell Bros factory near Wrexham General station in the First World War. Their football team raised money for hospitals and they even had a Tug O' War team. After the war, the company found a new niche as a motorcycle ...

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Back from the dead in Swansea

Jan 1, 2022

In 1290 a crowd watched William Crach, a prisoner at Swansea Castle, being hanged until he was dead, but later he began to breathe again. This was seen as a miracle and he was allowed to go free, on certain conditions. For more about the castle's ...

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Anglesey family's resistance heroine

Dec 24, 2021

Emma Henderson weighed less than 32kg (5 stones) when released in 1945 from a concentration camp, where she was held captive for helping the French Resistance. It was only then that she learned her husband Mario had died in Nazi ...

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Countess Haig's last home

Dec 16, 2021

Before she died in Bangor in 1939, Dorothy Countess Haig worked hard to defend the reputation of her late husband, Douglas Haig, who had commanded British forces in France and Belgium in the First World War. Many people blamed him ...

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Neath's high-tech ironworks

Dec 9, 2021

The towering remnants of Neath Abbey Ironworks include two of the best-preserved 18th-century blast furnaces in the world. Now you can use your smartphone to read about the innovative ironworks as you pass the remnants and to watch a new video of a beam engine ...

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Named in concrete at Fairbourne

Dec 1, 2021

You can't miss the anti-tank defences if you visit the beach at Fairbourne, near Barmouth, but look closely at some of the hundreds of blocks and you might find names or initials of local men, women and boys who ...

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Live commentary on silent movies

Nov 26, 2021

Abergavenny's Coliseum cinema, now a pub, provided good value for money in the days of silent movies, when the manager sometimes gave a running commentary - even using a stick to point out events ...

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Ideal homes for Caernarfon taxmen

Nov 15, 2021

Uxbridge Square in Caernarfon was built in the first half of the 19th century to provide spacious homes for the town's growing professional class. There were gates across the entrance, and several Inland Revenue officers, serving or retired, were ...

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Cross-dressing PoW's last arrest

Nov 7, 2021

The First World War was nearly over when a German lieutenant, well known for his convincing female impersonations, handed himself in at Cardiff Central police station. He had once escaped from ...

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African sailor's story revealed

Oct 31, 2021

Sailor Tom Savage from Sierra Leone lived in Newport from the First World War to the Second, in which he died. His eventful life included a near-death experience when a fellow sailor accidentally discharged a revolver. Now you can discover Tom's story by ...

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Scouts' war dead remembered

Oct 26, 2021

A new memorial at the Rowen Scout camp, in the Conwy Valley, commemorates the former Scouts of the district who died in the Second World War, and you can use the HistoryPoints QR codes by the gate to find out who ...

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Education pioneer's late start

Oct 14, 2021

Elizabeth Phillips Hughes of Carmarthen was a pioneer of girls' education in Wales and Cambridge and even taught in a Japanese university, but her own formal education hadn't started until she was a teenager. As a child she ...

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Caernarfon's famous Cape Horner

Oct 9, 2021

In the days of sail power, only the bravest seamen voyaged around Cape Horn, but ship's captain Robert Thomas of Caernarfon did it many times, breaking the record for the fastest Cardiff to San Francisco sailing in 1887. He died in San ...

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Russian jewels in Llandudno

Oct 2, 2021

The Wartski shop in Llandudno was already famous for supplying expensive jewellery to wealthy clients when objects from the family of the murdered Russian Tzar were displayed there in 1935. Eggs and other masterpieces by Carl Fabergé were among the ...

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Organic farming pioneer celebrated

Sep 24, 2021

A new Purple Plaque commemorates organic farming pioneer Dinah Williams at her former farm in Borth, Ceredigion. The plaque is accompanied by HistoryPoints QR codes so that anyone can use their smartphones to ...

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Death and taxes in Caernarfon

Sep 17, 2021

Sir Roger de Puleston was one of the most hated people in Wales when he collected taxes on behalf of King Edward I - so unpopular that he ended up hanged from the front of his house in the new walled town ...

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The 'Queen of Red Wharf'

Sep 11, 2021

Red Wharf Bay is one of Anglesey's most popular visitor areas but it wasn't on the tourist map until Margaret Roberts developed the Min-y-don Hotel to cater for well-heeled British and international guests. She was born at the property, one of 21 siblings, and ...

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Briton Ferry's towering relic

Sep 6, 2021

The old accumulator tower of Briton Ferry dock (near Neath) stands in isolation, surrounded by grassland, but now you can use your mobile and our QR codes to see aerial photos of its context in the 1930s. Our web page about the ...

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German PoW heroism in Tywyn

Aug 26, 2021

In August 1919, Britain enjoyed its first summer holiday since the war but there were still German prisoners of war at the Neptune Hall camp in Tywyn, Gwynedd. One of the PoWs was hailed as a hero after he dashed into the sea, fully ...

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Am-dram with a bang in Llangollen

Aug 21, 2021

Our new QR codes at Llangollen Town Hall explain, among other things, how an amateur drama group blew a hole in the roof when it took stage realism a step too far in the 1920s. The show needed one of the actors to pretend to fire ...

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Boys who pioneered cookery classes

Aug 13, 2021

Cookery lessons were still strictly for girls in the early 20th century, but in 1909 boys from Llandudno's Lloyd Street School broke new ground by taking a cookery course. There was much demand for chefs in the fashionable seaside resort, which obtained special permission ...

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Pyle's 'upside down' church

Aug 6, 2021

According to legend, St James' Church in Pyle, near Bridgend, is 'upside down' because it used stones from the earlier church in Kenfig, on a site engulfed in wind-blown sand; smaller stones from the upper parts of the old church were removed first ...

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Our QRs in new World Heritage Site

Jul 28, 2021

It's great news that UNESCO has awarded World Heritage Site status to the slate landscape of North Wales. If you live in or visit the slate area, look out for HistoryPoints QR codes which present on-the-spot information about slate quarries, workers, transport ...

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From lunch with Churchill to PoW in Wales

Jul 25, 2021

Wolfgang von Tirpitz lunched with Mr and Mrs Winston Churchill after tennis in summer 1913. The following summer, soon after war broke out, he was captured and sent to Llansannan (now in Conwy county) with fellow German officers. Winston ...

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QRs mark thriller writer's birthplace

Jul 17, 2021

Ethel Lina White of Abergavenny was such a talented writer of thrillers that she was compared in her day to Agatha Christie and Dorothy L Sayers. Alfred Hitchcock was among the directors ...

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Boat-tragedy victims remembered

Jul 6, 2021

On 6 July 1899 a collective funeral was held in Deiniolen, near Llanberis, for most of the nine children and three parents who drowned when a boat capsized off Pwllheli. The slate-quarrying community was shocked by the accident, which ...

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Martha Gellhorn's Purple Plaque

Jul 2, 2021

A Purple Plaque has been unveiled at the former home near Chepstow of war reporter Martha Gellhorn, with HistoryPoints QR codes for passers by to read about her and see her portrait. Martha, born in Missouri in 1908, was the only female reporter at the Normandy landings ...

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Cwmbrȃn's Phoenix-like mill

Jun 25, 2021

The new town of Cwmbrȃn looked set to lose one of its oldest buildings in the early 1970s, after boys set fire to the centuries-old Llanyrafon Mill. The building, which once had three pairs of millstones, was a roofless ruin for years, until a scheme ...

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Friog's carbon-copy train crashes

Jun 18, 2021

The concrete avalanche shelter visible from Fairbourne beach was a response to two fatal train accidents, 50 years apart, which had eerie similarities. In both cases, debris from the road and hillside above deflected a northbound ...

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From GIs and PoWs to rugby

Jun 11, 2021

Carmarthen Athletic's rugby ground in Johnstown has a fascinating history, which you can now discover by using your smartphone to scan the HistoryPoints QR codes at the entrance. Royal Marines, then American GIs ...

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German crash survivor's grisly end

Jun 8, 2021

Bruno Peronowski was one of three airmen who survived when their Heinkel bomber crashed on a Snowdonia peak south of Abergwyngregyn in 1941. Five years later, he was executed in Canada for murdering a ...

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Pub that was Wrexham's curse

Jun 1, 2021

The former Elephant & Castle Inn is now a pleasant micro-brewery tap but in Victorian times police named it Wrexham's "greatest curse". Women who lived in the rear yard violently used various objects including a fork to settle arguments, while the henchman of landlady Ellen ...

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Llanddew's lofty dedicatees

May 27, 2021

The church at Llanddew, near Brecon, has had four dedicatees since it was founded by early Christians, as you can discover by scanning the new HistoryPoints QR codes in the noticeboard with your smartphone. God was the dedicatee when travel writer Gerald of Wales ...

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Hanging Tower's history revealed

May 20, 2021

Countless people have strolled along the former quay in Caernarfon without realising the Victorians moved the town's execution place to one of the towers there, part of the medieval town wall. Now a slate plaque and accompanying HistoryPoints QR codes ...

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Swansea woman's Ohio safe house

May 13, 2021

Swansea teacher Jessie Donaldson helped fugitive American slaves reach freedom when she lived in Cincinnati. Now a purple plaque in her honour has been unveiled at the Swansea College of Art, and below it are HistoryPoints QR codes for ...

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Illicit love in wartime Llanrwst

May 1, 2021

Eileen Jones of Llanrwst found herself in court in 1942 because she had fallen in love. Residents were forbidden from fraternising with prisoners of war at the local camp but Eileen communicated with her Italian sweetheart by ...

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Where Snowdon's copper went

Apr 23, 2021

Thousands of walkers follow the Llanberis Path up and down Snowdon every year, but few realise that the route was once used to bring copper ore down from the mountain. Now HistoryPoints QR codes have been placed where the ore was stored ...

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Newgale's 'Old Testament' forest

Apr 15, 2021

Remnants of prehistoric forests have been exposed at places around the Welsh coast, but it's not a new phenomenon. Gerald of Wales noted in 1188 that a storm had exposed tree remains at Newgale which he thought were felled when Noah's ark ...

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Whisky galore on Llŷn Peninsula

Apr 6, 2021

120 years ago today, a ship bound for New Zealand crashed onto rocks near Porth Colmon. Locals quickly relieved the wreck of much of its precious cargo - including whisky, fine china and even pianos - before the nearest Customs officers ...

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Leila Megane 130th

Apr 5, 2021

The 1891 census, taken on 5 April, notes a baby aged "one day" living at Bethesda police station. She became the opera star Leila Megane, recording with Sir Edward Elgar, singing for wounded troops and marrying composer T Osborne Roberts. Now you can use your smartphone to ...

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Ebbw Vale on a roll

Mar 27, 2021

The origin of the towering metal roll stack displayed at Ebbw Vale is now explained to residents and visitors, who can scan the nearby HistoryPoints QR codes to read on their smartphones how the town's ailing fortunes were reversed in 1938 when ...

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Red faces at the rock face

Mar 21, 2021

Invited dignitaries and a large crowd gathered at the new Little Orme limestone quarry in 1891 to watch a giant explosion dislodge 100,000 tonnes of rock. Lord Mostyn lit one of the fuses leading into the explosives-packed tunnel but the result was ...

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Hear Aberdyfi's carillion on demand

Mar 13, 2021

The carillion in St Peter's Church, Aberdyfi, was tuned to play the popular song Clychau Aberdyfi ('The Bells of Aberdovey') and now you can hear it on your mobile as you stand outside, any time of day or night. Simply scan the HistoryPoints QR codes in ...

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More women's history on mobiles

Mar 8, 2021

Our coverage of Women's history received excellent press and TV publicity on International Women's Day 2019, and since then we've added many more stories to the list shown on this page. QR codes in Bethesda allow people to read how Elizabeth Williams ...

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Grieving mother's Icarus sculpture

Feb 26, 2021

Sculptor Christine Dixon was one of very few mothers to have witnessed their son's death in military service. The trauma resulted in the remarkable bronze sculpture of Icarus which you can see in Hay cemetery, where there are also German and Italian war graves. Christine ...

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Circus chaos at Holyhead

Feb 20, 2021

Since we installed our QR codes by the old Stanley toll house near Holyhead in 2015, many people have enjoyed the story of an entire travelling circus evading the toll in 1890. Further research has revealed that a leopard escaped while the circus was at Cae Morgan, a snake bit ...

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Harbour photo saved from skip

Feb 3, 2021

Our web page about Porthmadog harbour now has a fascinating Victorian photo showing sailing ships, ship-building and slate quays, thanks to sharp-eyed reader William Dyson-Laurie. He found the original print in a mass of inherited paperwork which ...

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Slavery opponents in Neath

Jan 25, 2021

Neath's old town hall is now 200 years old. When it was a decade old, it hosted a meeting to petition Parliament for abolition of slavery. Some Anglican clergymen spoke in support (despite others still owning slaves at the time). So did a Quaker, but in ...

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Burying children six days apart

Jan 16, 2021

Charles Jones was master of Bethesda's Pont y Tŵr School in 1852 when his eldest son, aged 10, died after falling down a cliff. Charles and wife Joanna then lost their infant son to whooping cough, burying their children just six days ...

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Room on the farm for Cardiff Baptists

Jan 7, 2021

When Baptists began to worship in the St Mellons area of Cardiff in the early 18th century, the only suitable places for meetings were local farmhouses. Visiting preachers came from as far away as Abergavenny. After using a paupers' house for a few decades, the local Baptists ...

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Right spy, wrong country

Jan 1, 2021

Chinese authorities accused Colwyn Bay mountaineer Sydney Wignall of spying for the CIA after they arrested him in the Himalayas in 1955. Under torture, Sydney could truthfully deny the charge, as he was actually spying for India ...

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Swansea Valley's Titanic loss

Dec 24, 2020

A gravestone outside the now-closed Seion Chapel in Glais records how Elizabeth Rogers of Ynys-y-mond Uchaf Farm lost three children, then her husband and - when the liner RMS Titanic sank on its maiden voyage - a son and ...

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Giant seaside arrow explained

Dec 13, 2020

Satellite views of the Wales Coast Path west of Pwllheli show a large concrete arrow in a field, pointing seawards. Our new QR codes beside the path there reveal that the arrow was created by the RAF to direct ...

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Booze bans, then and now

Dec 6, 2020

Today is the first Sunday under Wales' latest coronavirus restrictions on alcohol sales, but at least the situation is temporary. The 1881 law which banned alcohol sales on Sundays in Wales was permanent, albeit with long-distance travellers exempted. At The Plough in St Asaph, an early form of "booze cruise" brought ...

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Usk's early abolitionists

Nov 29, 2020

One of the first towns in Wales to petition for the abolition of British colonial slavery was Usk. The town hall was the venue in 1792 for a meeting where lively concern was expressed for the "unparalleled miseries" of African victims of the slave ...

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Bethesda 'Slates & Strikes' tour

Nov 22, 2020

Today is the 120th anniversary of the start of the three-year 'Great Strike' at Penrhyn slate quarry, Bethesda. Marking the occasion, HistoryPoints has created a self-guided tour of 19 QR-code sites which explain how the quarry and industrial disputes ...

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Fish trap for Colonel Pennant

Nov 14, 2020

When a humble quarryman dared to sue Colonel Pennant of Penrhyn Castle, Bangor, for confiscating his fishing net, the Colonel hired no less a person than Britain's solicitor-general as counsel. Yet the jury ...

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Tram and bus workers remembered

Nov 8, 2020

The war memorial at Newport Transport's headquarters isn't on public view, but now anyone can use their mobile to see a picture of it and read details of the war dead. Our web page also explains that the WW1 dead were tram workers, yet by WW2 ...

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Meirionnydd remembrance on mobiles

Nov 6, 2020

We have recently added eight war memorials in Meirionnydd to our coverage, which now features 170 war memorials across Wales. The HistoryPoints QR codes near each memorial allow you to discover much more than the list of inscribed names. In Aberdyfi, we've ...

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Old Colwyn WW1 tragedy revealed

Nov 1, 2020

Our contributor Stephen Binks spent almost a decade trying to identify the "J R Jones" on Old Colwyn war memorial. Now his detective work has paid off, revealing that John Parry Jones was one of three brothers who died within three months ...

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Slavery history in Wales

Oct 25, 2020

Our coverage of Welsh locations with a connection to slavery continues to grow. Click here to see the list of places so far, including Bodannerch in Rhyl and Kilvey Hill, Swansea. The QR codes for some of the ...

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Kilvey Hill's slavery connection

Oct 17, 2020

Visitors to Kilvey Hill, a popular viewpoint in Swansea, can now use their mobiles to discover how a mansion on the south-west slope was built by a businessman who had profited from slave labour in Jamaica. Pascoe ...

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How Bethesda got its name

Oct 11, 2020

Many villages and hamlets in Wales gained Biblical names because their chapels were their chief landmarks. Bethesda in Gwynedd was no exception, but the smattering of houses around the new Capel Bethesda in 1820 was replaced ...

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Nash Point in 1938

Oct 4, 2020

Our popular web page about Nash Point lighthouse, Vale of Glamorgan, has been updated with a previously unpublished photo taken through the glass of the high tower in 1938. Schoolteacher and amateur photographer Raymond Clark was ..

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Vicar's slavery secret uncovered

Oct 1, 2020

As Black History Month begins, take a look at our new web page which reveals how a large house in Rhyl was built by a respected vicar - using some of the fortune he'd amassed from exploiting black slaves in the Caribbean. The family ...

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Telegraph boy's WW1 deliveries

Sep 21, 2020

When telegraphs from the front arrived at Crickhowell Post Office during the First World War, it fell to Hector Parons, aged 14, to deliver the bad news to local families. He began work as ...

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Fishy business at Porth Ysgaden

Sep 11, 2020

The isolated gable wall of a ruined cottage is an eye-catching clifftop feature at Porth Ysgaden, on the Llŷn Peninsula. The family which once owned it is known to have colluded with pirates in the 16th century, and tenancy rules for ...

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Shotton's unequal bridge explained

Sep 4, 2020

A striking feature of Hawarden Bridge, in Shotton, is that one of the bowstring-girder spans is much bigger than the other two. Now you can discover the reason by using your smartphone to scan the new HistoryPoints QR codes beside the footpath ...

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When Builth was ready for the Nazis

Aug 29, 2020

Builth Wells, separated from the sea by mountain chains, seems an unlikely place for WW2 defences against Nazi invasion, but near the town's war memorial you can see the steel cap of an Alan-Williams turret. The turret was installed near the river bridge, which ...

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Market hall woes in Ruthin

Aug 22, 2020

Ruthin's market hall has been a popular facility for many generations, but there were many setbacks in its early years. Construction of the hall and adjoining town hall cost more than expected, driving the ...

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Shipwrecked and arrested in one day

Aug 8, 2020

Sailor Andrew McGill was lucky to be rescued from a barque wrecked at Cefn Sidan, Carmarthenshire, in 1899. But his day was about to get even worse, as he was ejected that evening from the White Lion Hotel, Ferryside, for over-indulging and later arrested ...

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Caught in bed in the old jail

Jul 25, 2020

Fraudster Henry Jones thought Dolgellau's old jail was an ideal place to lie low in 1897, as it had long since become a respectable hotel. After tricking people in a string of towns in England and Wales, his luck ran out when he was caught in bed ....

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Llandrindod aerodrome on film

Jul 6, 2020

Rare film footage of planes taking off from Llandrindod Wells aerodrome before WW2 has come to light, and you can now view it on your mobile when you visit the site. The film was made by Thomas Charles Price, a ...

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Statue history on your mobile

Jun 11, 2020

Amid the current renewal of interest in the history of people commemorated by statues, look out for HistoryPoints QR codes near Welsh statues so that you can read much more than is inscribed on the plinth. Simply scan the ...

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Railway history on the spot

May 10, 2020

When we launched HistoryPoints in 2012, we installed QR codes by the ground-breaking Tubular Bridge in Conwy and the site of the world's first locomotive water troughs, near Colwyn Bay. Since then we've featured over 140 stories ...

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Virtual walking with HistoryPoints

Mar 24, 2020

Scanning HistoryPoints QR codes with your mobile while you're out and about is on hold while emergency restrictions are in force to prevent the spread of coronavirus. But our information about the history of more than 1,600 places of interest in Wales is also available ...

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Macca's Beddgelert jaunt

Mar 13, 2020

Paul McCartney, of Beatles fame, stayed with his family at Plas Tanygraig, Beddgelert, in the 1980s but this was no ordinary sightseeing trip to the Snowdonia village. He was keen to meet Alfred Bestall, who wrote and illustrated Rupert Bear stories and ...

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War horse trouble in Aberthaw

Mar 6, 2020

The landlord of the Blue Anchor Inn at Aberthaw, Vale of Glamorgan, got a rude awakening as the First World War began in August 1914. He was ordered to surrender a horse for army use but handed it over to the authorities two days late. Accused of rejecting ...

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80 years since Inland Revenue evacuated

Feb 28, 2020

The Imperial Hotel, Llandudno, was a hive of activity at the end of February 1940 as 200 Inland Revenue workers arrived and began preparations for thousands of colleagues to evacuate from London. Now visitors and local residents can use their mobiles to scan HistoryPoints QR codes at ...

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Railway Institute boys remembered

Feb 22, 2020

The memorial to former members of the Bangor Railway Institute Boys' Corps who died in the First World War was hidden from public view for years, but has now been relocated to a prominent position at the city's railway station. Now we have placed QR codes beside ...

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Gilwern's great embankment revealed

Feb 16, 2020

Trees obscure the slopes of the massive canal embankment at Gilwern, Monmouthshire, but now visitors can use their mobile phones to understand the structure's scale and complex construction. The HistoryPoints QR codes beside the ...

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Rhuddlan's other castle

Feb 7, 2020

Thousands of visitors flock to Rhuddlan Castle every year but not so many follow the footpath which leads to the site of Rhuddlan's earlier castle, on Twthill. Although the Normans built that castle, a warm Welsh welcome was given in 1188 to ...

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Murder in the abbey

Jan 26, 2020

The site of Whitland Abbey is a secluded spot, well outside the town, but it wasn't always so peaceful in the abbey's heyday. In the late 15th century a priest was killed there by a visiting monk, and ...

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Enduring hospital legacy of WW1

Jan 20, 2020

Many buildings were turned into Red Cross auxiliary hospitals to treat wounded servicemen in the First World War but the one in Machynlleth is a rare example which remains a hospital ...

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Bethesda's bridge of contrasts

Jan 12, 2020

Many visitors cross Bethesda's Pont Twr to reach Europe's longest zip-wire ride at Penrhyn Quarry, but only the people who walk down to the riverbank will see why artists have ...

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They came, saw and were conquered

Jan 4, 2020

The conquering Roman army had a fort at what's now Penydarren Park in Merthyr Tydfil. More visitors from Italy arrived in 1987 - the superstar footballers of Atalanta BC - but this time they were beaten by the locals. The ...

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Newtown's mail-order monument

Dec 30, 2019

The imposing Royal Welsh Warehouse in Newtown is a monument to Pryce Jones, founder of the world's first mail-order business. Now you can use your smartphone to discover, among other things, why the building has "Royal" ...

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Toy story in Abergavenny

Dec 23, 2019

A Wendy Boston soft toy was an ideal Christmas present in the post-war decades - for parents as much as children. At their HQ in Abergavenny, Wendy and Ken Williams pioneered nylon teddy eyes which eliminated the risk ...

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Christmas murder victim's story

Dec 15, 2019

The story of William Murphy, the last man executed in Caernarfon, received much publicity at the time and subsequently, but what of the woman he murdered on Christmas night 1909? Historian Hazel Pierce has pieced together ...

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Military science in Rhyl

Dec 8, 2019

Some of Rhyl's more humdrum buildings provided suitably anonymous accommodation for British military scientists during the Second World War. Among them was the author of a ground-breaking book about ...

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Innkeepers' racing deaths

Dec 1, 2019

Horse racing played a big part in the lives - and deaths - of Welshpool father and son Harry and Herbert Rudge. Harry kept the Mermaid Inn, the timber-framed building in High Street which is dwarfed by its ...

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German glass in Aberpergwm

Nov 22, 2019

St Cadoc's Church at Aberpergwm, in the Vale of Neath, contains 16th-century glass from a German abbey - thanks to Napoleon, of all people. While his forces wreaked havoc, stained glass was removed from ...

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Bibles to boats in Y Felinheli

Nov 13, 2019

Today the Dinas area of Y Felinheli, near Caernarfon, is a centre of marine engineering, and it's all thanks to a Methodist preacher who moved to the area in 1847. The Rev Rees Jones established a ship-building business which ...

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Six more WW1 tours in Powys

Nov 9, 2019

HistoryPoints and the Powys War Memorials Project have created WW1 tours in six more communities, taking the total to nine tours. Each tour is a circuit of the town or village which reveals how the featured locations are connected to ...

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Milford Haven's guiding light

Nov 1, 2019

Lights at St Ann's Head have guided mariners into the Milford Haven waterway since long before the existing lighthouse was built in 1844. Lighthouses were recorded there in the 17th century, and before then a beacon may have been lit on the tower of ...

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Billy the Corn's unhealing wounds

Oct 23, 2019

Crickhowell publican 'Billy the Corn' was one of many men who continued to suffer long after the Armistice in 1918. His war wounds never healed, and for two decades his wife Katie dressed them every morning. Billy ...

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Wartime isolation in Conwy

Oct 16, 2019

Skin diseases spread rapidly in the Conwy area after the arrival of thousands of child evacuees 80 years ago. A house at the top of Cadnant Park was commandeered and became an isolation hospital, where ...

[More]

Torfaen's show-off engineer

Oct 9, 2019

One of Wales' oldest skew bridges crosses the canal at Govera, near Pontypool. It was simpler to build stone bridges at right angles, but the engineer for this part of the canal had worked for the innovative William Jessop ...

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WW1 honours for Powys nurse

Oct 2, 2019

Annie Breese, from a prominent Machynlleth family, began working on hospital ships soon after the First World War broke out. By November 1914 she had already made 11 return trips between England and ...

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Strongwoman's tale on your mobile

Sep 24, 2019

When Marged ferch Ifan wasn't wrestling, pulling pints, shoeing horses, doing carpentry or playing the harp, she could be found loading her boat with copper ore near Nant Peris, Snowdonia. She would row the laden ...

[More]

Gower's errant Knights

Sep 18, 2019

The church at Llanrhidian, Gower, was entrusted to the Knights Hospitaller in 1198, but two centuries later the bishop of St Davids was none too pleased to find the building in disrepair. He was even more upset when ...

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Arrested at belt-point

Sep 11, 2019

When two fugitive German prisoners of war were spotted near Welshpool in 1915, army officer Rhys Williams - who had just finished dinner - dashed off in pursuit, armed only with his leather belt. The ...

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WW2 evacuation stories on mobiles

Sep 3, 2019

A huge movement of people, organisations and valuable objects to Wales got underway 80 years ago, and now you can use your mobile to discover how familiar places helped to provide shelter from ...

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75 years since mass whale strandings

Aug 29, 2019

This weekend is the 75th anniversary of the stranding of more than 20 pilot whales along the shore of the Conwy Estuary, mainly at Deganwy. Now you can use your smartphone to see details and photos of ...

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Soap that put thief behind bars

Aug 22, 2019

When serial thief Robert Smith stole a bar of pink soap from the Lion Hotel, Newtown, in 1905, little did he suspect that it would lead to his downfall. Pink soap was then a luxury item and a scrap of it ...

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Laugharne hyenas

Aug 17, 2019

Hyenas once ruled the roost at Coygan Cave, west of Laugharne, suggests archaeological evidence found there. Bones of other animals - including mammoth, rhino and bear - found there were probably leftovers from dinner ...

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When women taught men how to sail

Aug 10, 2019

Our new QR codes on the door of Caernarfon's former mortuary reveal the extraordinary story of Ellen Edwards, a captain's daughter who taught more than 1,000 men how to navigate the seas. Her teaching career overlapped with that of Cranogwen, a ...

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A dad's expansive tribute to his son

Aug 2, 2019

Many people enjoy the wide and peaceful expanse of Crickhowell's Castle Recreation Grounds, but not all may realise it was given to the town in memory of a young army officer killed in the Battle of Cambrai, the first ...

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D-Day rehearsal in Amroth

Jul 25, 2019

The beaches of south Pembrokeshire are perfect for relaxation on a warm summer's day, but in July 1943 some were off limits to the public while a huge military exercise took place to prepare for D-Day. A curfew ...

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Conwy Castle history in BSL

Jul 19, 2019

Visitors who have hearing impairments can now receive a history of Conwy Castle in British Sign Language on their mobiles. Audio is provided for people with sight loss, and there are simplified English or Welsh subtitles. Simply scan ...

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Wales v England at the mill

Jul 11, 2019

There was trouble at t'mill in Newtown in 1875 after English workers were brought in to work new weaving looms. They resented Welsh employees being trained on the machinery, and violence broke out. The chief constable ...

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All craters, great and small

Jul 4, 2019

Walking the Wales Coast Path near Marros, Carmarthenshire, takes you through a minefield, but fear not - the explosives were detonated at the end of WW2 when invasion was no longer a threat. Many people pass the craters ...

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Wed-lock in the police station

Jun 28, 2019

A butcher in Bethesda, Gwynedd, was so unimpressed when his wife got drunk one night in 1906 that he took her to the police station and locked her in a cell. When the sergeant came to investigate ...

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Tribunal troubles in Ystradgynlais

Jun 22, 2019

The police station and court in Ystradgynlais had only just opened when military conscription began in 1916. The district tribunal heard appeals at the court and initially exempted many ...

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Iconic murder in Hawarden

Jun 16, 2019

According to local lore, an icon of the Virgin Mary in St Deiniol's Church, Hawarden, was prosecuted for murder after it fell onto Lady Trawst in 946AD. It was convicted and sentenced to ...

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Braving the anti-suffragist mobs

Jun 11, 2019

Suffragist leader Alix Minnie Clark endured the taunts and attacks of mobs opposed to women getting the vote, sometimes outside her Newtown home, but she continued campaigning throughout the ...

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Speeding to the grave in 1901

Jun 7, 2019

Speeding on the roads has killed countless people in the age of the motor car, but Bethesda publican David Williams came to the same end with his horse-drawn "car" in 1901. He had been punished several times ...

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A bridge too far in Cardiff

Jun 1, 2019

James Street in Butetown is now just an ordinary road where it passes the police station, but a giant steel swing bridge used to bisect it - and there were many grumbles about traffic being stopped for ...

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A real shambles in Hawarden

May 25, 2019

The archways next to the Glynne Arms in Hawarden may look mundane - one has been a bus shelter for decades - but they were created as butchers' stalls and were known as "the shambles". Two hooks ...

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Education pioneers remembered

May 18, 2019

A slate plaque was unveiled today at the former home of adult education pioneers Silyn and Mary Roberts in Tanygrisiau, near Blaenau Ffestiniog. HistoryPoints provided accompanying QR codes to enable ...

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From Gower to a South Pole grave

May 11, 2019

When visiting Rhossili, take a look inside the church to see memorials to Edgar Evans, who died on Captain Scott's ill-fated expedition to the South Pole. The iciness of his memorial window contrasts with the ...

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Humble home of Nelson's Emma

May 4, 2019

Emma Hamilton mixed with the nobility and became famous as Lord Nelson's mistress and mother of his child, but her childhood home in Hawarden, Flintshire, was a simple thatched cottage. Her beauty turned heads and she modelled ...

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Canal boats in the moat

Apr 28, 2019

The Norman castle at Pencelli, east of Brecon, has virtually disappeared yet part of its moat remains in water - and often used by canal boats. When the Monmouthshire & Brecon Canal was built in the 18th century, the ditch provided a ready-made ...

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Penny post's earliest advocate

Apr 20, 2019

When Samuel Roberts of Llanbrynmair (near Machynlleth) had retired to live with his brothers in Conwy, the Government gave him £50 in recognition of his social and postal reforms. As a young man in the 1820s, he had advocated a system of penny post ...

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Dublin's loss was Flintshire's gain

Apr 12, 2019

If the monument to William Ewart Gladstone in Hawarden strikes you as surprisingly large for such a small town, there's a fascinating explanation: the statue was made for the broad expanse of Dublin's Phoenix Park. The ...

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By boat beneath Queen Street

Apr 6, 2019

Thousands of shoppers walk along Cardiff's Queen Street every day, but few probably realise canal boats used to travel under the street. Now you can use your mobile to scan QR codes on the signpost outside Queen's Arcade ...

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Penmaenmawr photos revealed

Mar 31, 2019

Otto Vernon Darbishire was an early photography enthusiast. Among his subjects were his family's extensive quarries and related infrastructure in Penmaenmawr. Now two of his pictures, from a family album, can be seen on our ...

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History with your Swansea cockles

Mar 24, 2019

The next time you buy cockles and laverbread in Swansea Market, scan the HistoryPoints QR codes on the cockle stalls with your mobile to discover the remarkable tradition of women selling cockles there. Some routinely walked ...

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Talybont's drawbridge tradition

Mar 16, 2019

The modern steel drawbridge over the canal at Talybont-on-Usk may look like a modern invention, but if you scan the new HistoryPoints QR codes near the bridge with your mobile you'll see a photo of the wooden drawbridge ...

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Novelist's furtive beginnings

Mar 12, 2019

Roberta Leigh was a prolific writer of romantic novels, many published by Mills & Boon, and her first attempts at writing took place in torchlight under the bedclothes at St Mary's Convent School in Rhyl. She had been evacuated ...

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Swansea slum to Swedish palace

Mar 1, 2019

Lillian Davies began her life in what was considered to be slum housing in Garden Street, Swansea, now the southern area of the Quadrant shopping centre. Before her death in 2013, she lived in royal palaces for decades ...

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Wales' first female lawyer

Feb 20, 2019

Agnes Twiston Hughes broke the glass ceiling of the legal profession in 1923 when she was admitted to the Roll of Solicitors - the first Welsh woman to be admitted. She became Principal of her father's practice in Conwy in ...

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Managing miners' boozing

Feb 14, 2019

The colliery owners who built the workers' village of Oakdale, in Caerphilly county borough, didn't want drunkenness to mar the utopian living conditions, so they built an hotel in order to exert control over alcohol consumption. Magistrates approved ...

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Welsh to English via Latin

Feb 9, 2019

Point Lynas is a direct equivalent of Trwyn Eilian, but how did this Anglesey headland - noted for its lighthouse - get its English name? The answer lies in the Latinised version of the name of St Eilian, in whose honour ...

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Intrusive adverts ... in the 1890s

Feb 2, 2019

Irritating ads aren't a modern invention. In the 1890s, many Cardiff residents complained about a long and continuous row of new advertising hoardings along the Glamorganshire Canal facing people in Mill Lane. Although ...

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One for the road for 'John the Bottle'

Jan 26, 2019

We love Welsh nicknames at HistoryPoints, and the latest one you can discover through our QR codes and website is John y Botel ('John the Bottle'). He was a regular at the Plough Inn in Llandegla, Denbighshire, in the ...

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Heiress's fatal fall on Tryfan

Jan 12, 2019

We have featured an additional grave at Church Island, Menai Bridge, after historian Hazel Pierce provided the sad tale of Edna Pritchard, buried there in 1935. After her wealthy father's demise, Edna entered Oxford ...

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Engineering the shape of Wales

Jan 4, 2019

David Davies played a big part in the shaping of modern Wales, and nowhere more so than in Barry, where his statue stands. Starting with sawing timber and improving drainage on farms in Powys, he moved on to engineering …

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Seeing double on the towpath

Jan 4, 2019

The third bridge over the Monmouthshire & Brecon Canal, starting from the Brecon terminus, might look just like the canal’s other original bridges. But this one has a second arch, easily missed as you pass on foot or …

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Poet exiled by her famous sister

Dec 21, 2018

Poet and novelist Ann Hatton settled in Swansea after her sister, the celebrated actress Sarah Siddons, gave her an annuity on condition she lived at least 150 miles from London. Her antics as "Mrs Siddons' sister" had ...

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BSL videos widen accessibility

Dec 13, 2018

British Sign Language videos are starting to appear on HistoryPoints web pages, thanks to Conwy County Borough Council and the Centre of Sign Sight Sound (COS) in Colwyn Bay. The videos will give equal access to on-the-spot historical information for everyone ...

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Metric mutiny in Bethesda

Dec 8, 2018

Publican Geoffrey Davies was disgusted when the UK adopted decimal currency in 1971. For years, he continued to quote prices in his beloved pounds, shillings and pence to customers at the Douglas Arms Hotel in ...

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Laura Ashley's first store

Dec 1, 2018

Laura Ashley stores are popular in cities around the world, but the first of them all was in a small building - dating from c.1700 - in Machynlleth, Powys. Laura, a self-taught fabric designer from Dowlais, initially sold her ...

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A shop tailor-made for a novelist

Nov 24, 2018

Daniel Owen, the first significant Welsh-language novelist, didn't have to look far when he needed inspiration for new characters. He kept a tailor's shop in Mold, and the steady stream of customers gave him plenty of ...

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Church organ's French connection

Nov 17, 2018

The organ at St Illtud's Church, Llantwit Major, is easily overlooked because there are so many other fascinating objects nearby, including medieval wall paintings, Celtic stones and a 13th-century Jesse niche. The organ was played by Gabriel Fauré ...

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Celebrating USA's 1st woman senator

Nov 10, 2018

QR-code plaques enabling people to discover the story of the USA's first female senator were put up in Llandudno this week - coinciding with a record number of women winning seats in the USA's mid-term elections. Martha Hughes Cannon was born in ...

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The story of a dog's tale

Nov 3, 2018

The story of Prince Llywelyn's faithful hound Gelert has been told and retold for centuries and inspired the creation of the dog's "grave" in Beddgelert c.200 years ago. The basic legend has an even longer history, having been told in India ...

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Brecon wartime links uncovered

Oct 31, 2018

Connections between familiar Brecon landmarks and the First World War can now be discovered using digital technology and QR codes at 14 locations in the town. The "Brecon in WW1" trail was created by HistoryPoints in conjunction ...

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Suffragettes at the Eisteddfod

Oct 23, 2018

When David Lloyd George gave a speech at the National Eisteddfod in Wrexham in 1912, he was heckled by suffragettes, including one who had been force-fed hundreds of times while in prison. The protest was an insult to the Eisteddfod, in ...

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War messages intercepted at Pandy

Oct 17, 2018

Today is the 100th anniversary of the death of Edward Russell-Clarke, whose wireless wizardy enabled Britain to intercept low-frequency German messages throughout most of the First World War. His rural home in Pandy, Monmouthshire, was the unlikely ...

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Guide to Cathedral war memorials

Oct 14, 2018

Visitors to Brecon Cathedral can now use their mobiles to receive an introduction to the many war memorials in the medieval Havard Chapel, which was dedicated in 1922 to the 24th Regiment of the South Wales ...

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New town, same old manor

Oct 7, 2018

The new town of Cwmbrȃn is a textbook example of post-war urban planning but its history goes back much further, as evidenced by Llanyrafon Manor, south of the town centre. Some of the medieval building which stood on the site ...

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Pieces of Wales in every classroom

Sep 30, 2018

Children around the world learned literacy and numeracy using Welsh slates, many of which came from an obscure inlet near Llanfairpwll, Anglesey. The Britannia Slate Works at Pwllfanogl received slate from ...

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Brecon's monument to language change

Sep 22, 2018

Nonconformists in Brecon worshipped in Welsh until the advent of railways and National Schools brought new demand for services in English. In response, the Presbyterian Church at The Watton was built, featuring a prominent ...

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Cardiff's Victorian barrage plan

Sep 14, 2018

More than 120 years before the Cardiff Bay barrage was completed, businessman John Batchelor proposed an embankment between the same points to create a giant harbour. His plan depended on rival vested interests ...

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A smashing time in Criccieth

Sep 7, 2018

Two suffragettes heckled David Lloyd George at a Liberal rally in Criccieth in June 1914, drawing the attention of police. Meanwhile, other women began to smash the windows of commercial buildings, including the town's ...

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War-loss mother's food penalty

Aug 31, 2018

Magdalen Davies of Brecon lost her son Ivor in the First World War, 100 years ago this month. Seven months later, she was fined for selling a tin of salmon for more than the maximum permitted under wartime price controls, which ...

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Coining it in Llantwit Major

Aug 26, 2018

In the 11th century, the last Welsh lord of Glamorgan minted his own coins in Llantwit Major and reputedly stored them in a bank where the Old Swan Inn now stands. From the 1640s the owner of the current building ...

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Dun charging in St Asaph

Aug 21, 2018

'Dun Charging' would have been an apt alternative name for The Talardy in St Asaph, Denbighshire, when Thomas Everard Hutton lived there. He had survived the notorious 'Charge of the Light Brigade' in 1854 but was wounded in both ...

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Machynlleth's gift to baseball

Aug 12, 2018

A terraced house in Machynlleth seems an unlikely place of origin for an American baseball star, but that's where Ted Lewis, the "Pitching Professor", spent his first years. Playing for the team later known as the Boston Red Sox ...

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Hollywood star's Cardiff fright

Aug 5, 2018

Anthony Perkins scared millions in Psycho, but it was his turn to get a fright when he was arrested at Cardiff's Angel Hotel in 1989. He'd posted a little cannabis to himself in advance, for use while ...

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Fakery has stood the test of time

Aug 1, 2018

Looking at the decorative stone arch outside Tremadog church, in Gwynedd, you might wonder why the fine details haven't been eroded in over 200 years of exposure to the elements. You can discover the answer by ...

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Scandal of Aber's boozing JPs

Jul 23, 2018

The SPAR shop in Great Darkgate Street, Aberystwyth, was a scene of scandal in 1879 when it was a hostelry called the Gogerddan Arms. Magistrates in the men-only "Smokey Face Club" enjoyed their booze-up so much ...

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Menai Bridge grave stories revealed

Jul 19, 2018

Visitors to one of Wales’ most beautiful cemeteries can now use their mobiles to discover the fascinating stories of grave occupants. Our mini-tour of Church Island, Menai Bridge, will take you to the graves of 19 people who ...

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Court out of the pub in Northop

Jul 12, 2018

The Victorian Sessions House in Northop, Flintshire, was built after people objected to the customary setting for magistrates' courts - rooms in local pubs. The new complex was designed by one of the region's top ...

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Michaelmas rays on the altar

Jul 2, 2018

Two medieval window apertures in a Monmouthshire church seem to be out of alignment, unless you visit on a sunny Michaelmas evening. Then you should see a shaft of sunshine falling on the altar at St Michael's Church in ...

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Locked out by their own vicar

Jun 26, 2018

The vicar of Beaumaris went to extraordinary lengths in the 1880s to prevent worship at one of his churches, in rural Llandegfan. He even disobeyed his own bishop. The House of Lords eventually suspended the Rev ...

[More]

Turncoat's castle in Holt

Jun 19, 2018

The ruined Holt Castle is a scene of riverside tranquillity today, but in the late 15th century its owner, Sir WIlliam Stanley, was caught up in the Wars of the Roses. King Richard III took Stanley's son hostage to ensure ...

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Pit blast survivor's war sacrifice

Jun 11, 2018

Fred Trump of Rhymney was manager of one of the world's biggest gold mines after surviving a pit explosion which buried him under fallen coal. He left his job in South Africa to fight in the First World War and was killed, aged 45, while ...

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Free beer for William Dafydd

Jun 3, 2018

When Tŷ Isaf, Beddgelert, was an inn, it had a legendary four-pint (2.3-litre) beer pot. Anyone who emptied it in one go wouldn't have to pay for their drink. Local sawyer William Dafydd was one of the few who could ...

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Co-op pioneer's early break

May 25, 2018

Countless young men have wished, in vain, for a chance to improve the world. Robert Owen, a saddler's son from Newtown, got his chance when he became co-owner of a cotton mill while still in his 20s. He set about ...

[More]

U-boat victims' warm welcome

May 17, 2018

When a Norwegian ship's lifeboat arrived at Llangrannog, Ceredigion, in December 1917, villagers quickly lit fires in their homes and fetched dry clothes. One of the sailors had died of exposure after a U-boat sank ...

[More]

Bangor's MN sacrifice revealed

May 14, 2018

Research by the Merchant Navy Association (Wales) has revealed 18 additional Bangor men who died in the Second World War as a result of serving on merchant shipping. They are not named on the city's war ...

[More]

Brecon baker's brushes with law

May 7, 2018

A Brecon baker landed in court several times before, during and after the First World War on various charges, including cruelty to the horse which delivered his bread. The driver of the cart, William Howcroft, was ...

[More]

When cannons stirred tithe protest

May 1, 2018

Hundreds of police and soldiers descended on the village of Mochdre, near Colwyn Bay, in 1887 to accompany tithe collectors. Lookouts who had kept watch from a nearby hill fired cannons to alert residents, who ...

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Education pioneer's missing digit

Apr 29, 2018

The statue of Lord Aberdare which faces Cardiff's original university building depicts the education pioneer with right hand intact, but in 1886 one of the fingers was partly amputated after his shotgun ...

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Jasper Tudor's last stand in Wales

Apr 22, 2018

The Lancastrians had almost been crushed in the 'Wars of the Roses' when a battle was fought at Twthill, Caernarfon, in October 1461. Jasper Tudor, Henry Holland and their men were soon overpowered ...

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Trapped by a newsagent's pencil

Apr 13, 2018

A wealthy Stafford merchant almost got away with dumping his illegitimate baby's body, wrapped in newspaper, in the sea near Dolgellau, but he forgot that his newsagent had written his name on ...

[More]

Entertained by Cardiff hangings

Apr 3, 2018

Large crowds used to gather on Cardiff's St Mary Street, by the present-day market entrance, not for shopping but to watch people being hanged. The magnificent Victorian market hall stands where a prison ...

[More]

Powys preacher's patriotism

Mar 30, 2018

Preacher Rhys Thomas Prydderch applied several times to join the army in the First World War. He was eventually accepted, but died just days after reaching the Western Front. In Talgarth, his home ...

[More]

Poet Cynan's origins revealed

Mar 23, 2018

Shoppers and visitors in Pwllheli can now use their mobiles to discover how an ordinary shop building was the birthplace of an extraordinary writer. The parents of poet and dramatist Cynan kept ...

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Tapping lifeboat SOS on pipes

Mar 18, 2018

Mobile phones and a new seafront station enable Llandudno's lifeboat to respond rapidly in emergency, but originally the cox was called by tapping pipework at a mine entrance. Coxswain ...

[More]

Temperance coffee still available

Mar 11, 2018

A charity shop in Crickhowell, Powys, still makes coffee available to any "weary traveller" in need of refreshment because it occupies a former temperance house. The Queen Coffee Tavern ...

[More]

Poet's demise in the workhouse

Mar 4, 2018

MPs and literary figures urged the government to grant the poet Glaslyn a pension after he was forced to move to Penrhyndeudraeth workhouse. It was reported that the Prime Minister agreed to ...

[More]

Northop's philanthropic foundling

Feb 26, 2018

Owen Jones was abandoned as a baby at Northop church, Flintshire, but had amassed enough wealth by his death in 1659 to set up a charity for orphaned children and widows' families ...

[More]

Cross-dressing rioters in 1839

Feb 21, 2018

When discontent among Carmarthenshire's rural poor boiled over in 1839, men dressed in drag and attacked the hated tollgate at Efailwen. Twice the gate was repaired ...

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Barmaid tried for Valentine libel

Feb 14, 2018

A young Pwllheli barmaid was tried at the Assizes - equivalent to today's Crown Court - in 1890 for sending libellous Valentine's letters. A master mariner was called a "dry land captain" in ...

[More]

Suffragists in Llandudno Cocoa House

Feb 6, 2018

As Britain marks 100 years since women (some, at least) were first allowed to vote, suffragettes naturally take the limelight. But many others, who were known as suffragists, also ...

[More]

Cruelty to animals in 1894

Jan 29, 2018

When a Cwmbrân farmer needed help after becoming paralysed, he hired a one-legged war veteran. Soon the RSPCA found, in 1894, that 20 horses at Castell-y-bwch were ...

[More]

Saved by the ring in Llanfair TH

Jan 20, 2018

A simple iron ring on the door of St Mary's Church at Llanfair Talhaiarn (Conwy county borough) is a relic of Britain's justice system of yore. Anyone fleeing from law ...

[More]

When hunger drove women to riot

Jan 13, 2018

In January 1752 the Riot Act was read at Pwllheli Harbour after a mob, mostly women, tried to steal from a ship. They and their families were starving, following a poor harvest. In ...

[More]

Newtown's mail order pioneer

Jan 3, 2018

Long before e-commerce, Newtown flannel maker Pryce Jones realised that the town's new connection to the national rail network enabled him to advertise ...

[More]

Stories of park's memorials revealed

Dec 28, 2017

Alexandra Gardens in Cardiff has a concentration of memorials, and now HistoryPoints QR codes enable visitors to read the stories behind them. The information ...

[More]

Holyhead US air tragedy remembered

Dec 22, 2017

Today is the anniversary of a plane accident near Holyhead in which eight US airmen lost their lives in 1944. Now we have placed QR codes by the memorial in ...

[More]

Railway tragedy in Pwllheli

Dec 7, 2017

Pwllheli station is a place of happy memory for countless holidaymakers, but it was a scene of tragedy in 1889 when a talented young musician fell under the wheels of a train ...

[More]

Revolting barons in Neath

Nov 29, 2017

The Normans' castle at Neath was damaged or destroyed several times by Welsh attackers before Normans themselves had a go in 1322, damaging it again. Angry barons ...

[More]

Fly me to London ... from Llandod

Nov 20, 2017

In the 1930s Llandrindod Wells not only had its own aerodrome but also an air taxi service offering to take affluent passengers to London and other distant cities. The aerodrome ...

[More]

Prominent pub porch in Pwllheli

Nov 13, 2017

The porch at Penlan Fawr, Pwllheli, wouldn't get planning permission today because it almost blocks the entire pavement. But things were different in the 17th century, when a licence ...

[More]

Railwaymen remembered in Cardiff

Nov 9, 2017

The Taff Vale Railway Roll of Honour at Cardiff Queen Street station lists hundreds of TVR men who served in the First World War, and now details of those who died are available on your mobile. Simply ...

[More]

Talgarth's WW1 story on your mobile

Nov 8, 2017

New QR codes at 11 places in Talgarth reveal how the First World War affected this small rural town. Two popular preachers, a postman and a clothes-shop manager were among the well-known ...

[More]

Coal Exchange's Dahl connection

Nov 2, 2017

Cardiff's grand Coal Exchange, now partially reopened as an hotel, was once the workplace of Roald Dahl's father, Harald, among many others involved in shipping goods through ...

[More]

Welfare down the pub in Dolgellau

Oct 29, 2017

In 1802, long before the advent of the state pension and sickness benefits, the Golden Goat pub in Dolgellau became home to a friendly society whose members received financial ...

[More]

Chapel which became a mosque

Oct 22, 2017

The Congregational Chapel in Victoria Road, Newport, is one of South Wales' most imposing chapels, built at great cost in the 1850s. Since 2008 it has been a mosque, reflecting ...

[More]

Flintshire place-names demystified

Oct 19, 2017

Congratulations to our contributor Prof Hywel Wyn Owen on the launch of his book The Place-Names of Flintshire last night. The book, which Hywel ...

[More]

Headmaster's impressive roll of honour

Oct 13, 2017

In 1915 Talgarth headmaster WT Davies listed his past pupils serving in the war. The tally of 95 was impressive for a rural school, but he'd been head there since 1872! When ...

[More]

A church built on public outrage

Oct 6, 2017

The church in Gorsedd, Flintshire, was funded by donations from people around Britain who were incensed when an artistocratic couple chose to give to the Catholic Church ...

[More]

Waiting a century for toll abolition

Sep 30, 2017

In 1909 an official request was made for abolition of the Pont Briwet toll near Penrhyndeudraeth. The unpopular charge for road users was scrapped - 104 years later! The bridge ...

[More]

Viaduct? What viaduct?

Sep 23, 2017

The name of Brecon's Viaduct House is puzzling today, because all traces of the railway viaduct which crossed The Struet and the river Honddu vanished decades ago. Brecon was ...

[More]

80 years since pre-war RAF crash

Sep 17, 2017

On 17 September 1937 three RAF airmen died when their plane crashed into the shallow sea off Penmaenbach headland, Conwy. There's no memorial to them locally but now ...

[More]

Cathedral resurrected from ashes

Sep 5, 2017

Take a look inside the Metropolitan Cathedral of St David, in Cardiff city centre, and you may find it hard to believe that the interior fittings and roof didn't exist 70 years ago. The Luftwaffe ...

[More]

Cwmorthin ruins' busy past revealed

Aug 28, 2017

Walkers passing the famous ruined cottages at Cwmorthin, near Blaenau Ffestiniog, are in for a surprise if they scan our nearby QR codes, which reveal how many people lived ...

[More]

Methodist leader's C of E inspiration

Aug 22, 2017

Howell Harris was a key figure in the spread of Methodism across Wales in the 18th century, but it was at Talgarth's Anglican church that ...

[More]

Wartime tragedy in August gale

Aug 5, 2017

Unsettled August weather brought tragedy to the west coast of Anglesey in 1941, when 11 men died trying to rescue three airmen whose plane had crashed into ...

[More]

Llandudno prom all lined up

Jul 30, 2017

Recently reopened as a restaurant after major refurbishment, the Washington is a landmark on Llandudno's famous promenade but might never have been built had the original hotel ...

[More]

Sword champion of the Griffin Inn

Jul 25, 2017

It's a fair bet that George White, landlord of the Griffin Inn at Dale, Pembrokeshire, never had trouble from drinkers - he'd been the British Army's champion swordsman ...

[More]

C of E's loss was Capuchins' gain

Jul 18, 2017

Lord and Lady Fielding caused a scandal when they gave Capuchin friars a Flintshire church they'd built as a gift to the Church of England. They converted to Catholicism ...

[More]

Keeping the Lancastrian flame alight

Jul 11, 2017

It's reputed that Barmouth's Tŷ Gwyn, now home to a seafront restaurant and maritime museum, was built as a safe house for Jasper Tudor during a low point in Lancastrian fortunes. Jasper and his nephew Henry ...

[More]

Shedding light on art studies

Jul 5, 2017

It's no coincidence that the windows of Carmarthen's Oriel Myrddin Gallery admit so much light - the building was designed for art students. Founded in 1854, Carmarthen School of Art ...

[More]

Wartime blackout fine ... in 1916

Jul 1, 2017

Fines for showing lights at night were common in the Second World War, but in the First World War a Llandrindod Wells hotelier was punished after electric light ...

[More]

King's Messenger's will uncovered

Jun 24, 2017

A bust of Thomas Davis, Messenger to King Charles I, has adorned St Tegfan's Church on Anglesey for centuries but it wasn't till 10 years ago this month that his ...

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Dry docks up a hill, far from sea

Jun 15, 2017

Dry docks are commonly found on the coast, so it may be a surprise to find two of them 40 metres above the river Dee at Trevor, Wrexham. They were built before 1835 ...

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Wartime tragedy in Cenarth

Jun 8, 2017

Argoed Meadows, on the banks of the river Teifi in Cenarth, is a place of happy memories as it's home to a popular camping and caravan park, but in 1944 an RAF bomber attempted an emergency ...

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Bevan-sent opportunity in Cardiff

May 29, 2017

Many young people and visitors to Cardiff may pass Aneurin Bevan's statue in Queen Street without realising his significance, but now they (and anyone else) can use their mobiles to ...

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Menai pilot wails

May 23, 2017

The pilots of Penmon, Anglesey, saved many lives in Victorian times but by the early 20th century they were regarded by some as being part of a money-making racket. Every ...

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Radnorshire's aviators documented

May 17, 2017

Congratulations to our contributor Phillip Jones on the publication of his comprehensive history of aviation in Radnorshire. As well as stories of wartime ...

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Pigs on the vicar's lawn

May 13, 2017

Six pigs from a farm near Abergavenny landed their owner in hot water in 1916 when they raided the vicar's garden. Pen-y-Dre Farm is well worth a look ...

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Flint's normal Oddfellows

May 6, 2017

Flint's prominent Oddfellows' Hall has the letters MU above its date. If you're thinking Manchester United, you're only a letter or two out. The initials are ...

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Read Spitfire pilot's story at memorial

Apr 29, 2017

A memorial was erected on Caerphilly Mountain in 2015 to a young Canadian airman who died there in 1941. Now HistoryPoints has provided ...

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Flying drones in the 1940s

Apr 22, 2017

Drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles, seem to be everywhere these days but their history on Anglesey goes back to the early 1940s, when biplanes known as "Queen Bees" were ...

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French answer to heresy in Wales

Apr 13, 2017

Llanarmon in the Ceiriog Valley, near Wrexham, is one of many places in Wales named after a 5th-century bishop of Auxerre, France. St Garmon came to Wales in 429AD to ...

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Devilish paradox in Ceredigion

Apr 8, 2017

The triple-decked Devil's Bridge, east of Aberystwyth, is linked to the legend of a woman outwitting the devil, but its Welsh name, Pontarfynach, is at the other end of the spectrum of goodness. The last ...

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Everest QR codes may pique curiosity

Mar 31, 2017

Scan our QR codes by the A40 west of Crickhowell and you'll discover that the house just up the hill was once the home of George Everest, after whom the world's highest mountain ...

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DIY money on Anglesey

Mar 24, 2017

A national shortage of small coins in the 18th century was no problem for one Anglesey company - which simply minted its own currency. The coins were accepted in London ...

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Beer today, gone tomorrow

Mar 18, 2017

SA Brain produced beer at the Old Brewery, in the centre of Cardiff, from 1882 to 1999, but the brewery goes back much further. It was already known as the Old Brewery when Samuel ...

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Feeding opium to babies

Mar 11, 2017

In 1901 a young man was charged with trying to kill himself by jumping off Llangollen Bridge. His mother told magistrates she had fed her boys opium as babies, on doctor's orders, and continued ...

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Welsh sports history

Mar 5, 2017

Over the years we've featured many sporting venues and other places connected with sports events or people (and we'll be adding more). Now you can browse the stories using ...

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Seeing red over yellow limewash

Feb 25, 2017

There was an outcry when Crickhowell's 15th-century gatehouse received a coat of yellow limewash in the 1990s. The colour had been matched ...

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Village's response to bomber crash

Feb 18, 2017

The village bobby was on his night off when an RAF bomber crashed near Bwlchgwyn, Wrexham, in 1943. Three local men dashed to the scene and found one of the eight airmen alive. He ...

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Birthplace of BBC Cymru Wales

Feb 11, 2017

The BBC was accused of airing too many hymns after setting up its first studio in Wales in a room above a Cardiff shop. The studio broadcast to south-west England as well as ...

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Pwllheli captain's family separation

Feb 4, 2017

Ship's captain Thomas Pritchard only got to see his children twice, in 1929 and 1935, before being taken to a
Japanese prisoner of war camp where he died ...

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Louis Pasteur's Crickhowell "rival"

Jan 28, 2017

John Williams had a reputation as a healer in Victorian Crickhowell, so when he announced he'd found a cure for rabies the press reported that M Pasteur of Paris had a rival ...

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Toll evasion - by an entire circus

Jan 22, 2017

Loathing of tolls in Wales goes back long before the Severn Bridge was thought of, and in 1890 an entire travelling circus and menagerie evaded an Anglesey toll. There were 66 horses pulling ...

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Welsh legends on your mobile

Jan 14, 2017

This year is the "Year of Legends" in Wales, and HistoryPoints is providing on-the-spot access to ancient tales at many places across the country. We've also gathered ...

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When Wales felt Franklin's wrath

Jan 7, 2017

When buildings in Fishguard were damaged by a privateer in 1779, the townsfolk had no idea that inventor Benjamin Franklin was behind the attack. Franklin was ...

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A weighty subject in Rossett

Jan 2, 2017

Machine House is a puzzling name for a pair of non-industrial buildings in the centre of Rossett, near Wrexham. But this was once the location of a weighbridge, a device which ...

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Up before dawn on Christmas Day

Dec 24, 2016

Children leaving their beds before dawn on Christmas Day isn't a modern phenomenon in Wales. In olden times, they'd go to the plygain service, whose name comes from "cock crow" in ...

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Medic, bookworm ... and serial killer?

Dec 21, 2016

Sir John Williams was renowned as an obstetrician in his day but perhaps his most lasting legacy lies in the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth. He donated much of his valuable book ...

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The root of the matter in Haulfre

Dec 11, 2016

Many visitors to Haulfre Gardens, Llandudno, have seen the strange metal planter at the tearooms. Now you can scan the QR codes by it with your mobile to discover that it was ...

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Haverfordwest's bridge to the throne

Dec 3, 2016

Henry Tudor had no time to lose after landing, from exile, in Pembrokeshire in 1485 so he made a beeline for Haverfordwest, where he knew that his small and still vulnerable army ...

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Where evolution pioneer left his mark

Nov 25, 2016

Alfred Russel Wallace was a pioneer of the evolution theory now commonly attributed to Charles Darwin, but before becoming a renowned biologist he designed the Mechanics' Institute in Neath. He ...

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When illicit beer kept navvies at bay

Nov 18, 2016

As navvies built dams in north-east Snowdonia, illicit alcohol sales in the hills kept the "uncouth" men from visiting the Conwy Valley. The police turned a blind eye, but the landlord of Y Bedol ...

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Llandrindod's FWW stories on tap

Nov 11, 2016

The fascinating stories of buildings and other places in Llandrindod Wells during the First World War is now available to residents and visitors on their smartphones. Some 4,000 men of the Royal Army ...

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Balloon bother in Mold

Nov 6, 2016

One of the most unusual guests ever at the Cross Keys Hotel, Mold, was a man named Dobb, who arrived unconscious after being gassed by a faulty balloon. At the fire brigade's ...

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When witches terrorised Anglesey

Oct 31, 2016

Anglesey people lived in fear of the witches of Llanddona until well into the 19th century. The first witches and their equally fearsome menfolk were said to have drifted ...

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No stage fright for Belgian refugee

Oct 29, 2016

When a schoolgirl's fairy costume caught fire during a school concert in Llandrindod Wells in 1916, the only child brave enough to take action was a Belgian refugee called ...

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Abergavenny mansion saved

Oct 20, 2016

Hundreds of people have read our information about Abergavenny's Gunter mansion and its clandestine Catholic chapel since our QR codes went on display there in 2012, but ...

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Smelting to surfing in Snowdonia

Oct 16, 2016

The Conwy Valley's inland surfing centre - the first of its kind in the world - wouldn't exist had an aluminium factory not been established at the site more than 100 years ...

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Powys college building's tragic past

Oct 8, 2016

The Llandrindod Wells campus of the NPTC Group of Colleges occupies a former hotel, whose landlady lost two sons in the First World War and pleaded for her third ...

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Three cheers for Adam of Usk!

Oct 1, 2016

We should thank a medieval lawyer for the survival of the ancient Priory Church of St Mary in Usk. The priory's finances were as weak as some of the priory buildings' foundations when ...

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Great Orme's fascinating graves

Sep 25, 2016

An MP's son who innocently chose his grave soon before dying, a victim of the Red Baron, a silhouette artist and a chaired bard are just some of the people whose stories ...

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Breaking law to keep tourists clean

Sep 18, 2016

Women at the large Grange Laundry in Rhyl were found working illegally long shifts in 1909. Managers said they knew they were breaking the law but otherwise visitors ...

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Transport delight in Llandrindod

Sep 11, 2016

The Automobile Palace in Llandrindod Wells is testament to the enthusiasm of its builder for all forms of transport. It carries the words "Cycles", "Motors" and "Aircraft", just three of ...

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A job Well done in Llanrhos

Sep 4, 2016

St Mary's Well at Llanrhos, near Llandudno, was lost under rubble until 1993. Now the Deganwy History Group has installed an interpretation board, complete with HistoryPoints QR ...

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Stained-glass khaki in Clydach

Sep 2, 2016

One of the earliest church windows to depict British soldiers in khaki was installed in 1919 in Clydach, Swansea Valley. It was given in memory of John Ynys Palfrey Jones ...

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Finding the gold of Mold

Aug 30, 2016

This year marks the 180th anniversary of the British Museum's first acquisition of fragments of the Mold cape, sparking a reconstruction effort sustained over generations. The task wasn't helped ...

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Red Warth Bay: it's all in the name

Aug 19, 2016

Red Wharf Bay, Anglesey, is popular with visitors but few of them probably know that the name is an old corruption of Red Warth Bay. Unless, that is, they've spotted the new HistoryPoints ...

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A bark door exit in Brecon

Aug 16, 2016

Dogs which interrupted the sermon at St Mary's Church in Brecon would be seized with special tongs and ejected through a purpose-built dog door, which you can still ...

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Killed by a pinprick

Aug 11, 2016

Sarah Franke of the Old Vaults Inn, Ruabon, pricked herself with a pin in 1891. She suffered blood poisoning and died, aged 47. Her husband Oscar was an immigrant ...

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Suffragette fears at Eisteddfod

Aug 2, 2016

When the National Eisteddfod of Wales was held in Abergavenny in 1913 there were concerns that suffragettes might use the event to protest for women's votes. A hayrick near the maes in ...

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The king's double in North Wales

Jul 25, 2016

Llandudno newsagent GR Thompson looked uncannily like the reigning monarch, King Edward VII. So much so that he had his own portrait printed on the backs of postcards ...

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A bicycle for treewheeling

Jul 17, 2016

The Tour de France on modern bikes would have been a doddle for early cyclists whose machines had frames and wheels of wood! You can see one of those bikes in Llandrindod Wells, in ...

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Usk's appealing court

Jul 9, 2016

The Sessions House in Usk was designed in grand style for the regional quarter sessions court. The last felons were tried there in 1995, 25 years after one of the courtrooms ...

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Rhyl's backfiring Cut lawsuit

Jul 2, 2016

In 1909 Rhyl Council became a defendant in a court case where the prosecutor was ... Rhyl Council! What started as an attempt to force a butcher to tidy the Cut ...

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Sarah Siddons' real-life drama

Jun 24, 2016

Sarah Siddons, born in Brecon in 1755, became Britain's leading tragic actress, but her youthful romance with William Siddons was almost as dramatic as ...

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Good Samaritan foresaw his fatal mishap

Jun 17, 2016

Henry Bowen left his pint at the Vardre Inn, Clydach, one day in 1894 to warn hauliers that the road outside was too soft for the giant boiler they were delivering to Glais. As he alerted ...

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Take our QR codes home from Conwy

Jun 14, 2016

For the past four years, HistoryPoints QR codes in the walled town of Conwy have unlocked the stories of interesting features on the spot. Now an attractive new town trail leaflet includes ...

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Birthplace of Wales' football team

Jun 10, 2016

Wales' participation in the UEFA European Championships 2016 stems from a Ruabon solicitor's opposition to calls from South Wales that rugby was the sport ...

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Miners' mortgage for betterment

Jun 6, 2016

Miners in Newbridge were so intent on having a suitable facility for eduction and recreation in the early 20th century that they took out a mortgage to build an Institute. Similar ...

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Letter returned from Jutland battle

May 31, 2016

The smoke of the Battle of Jutland had long since cleared when a Swedish man picked from the sea the overcoat of Robert Willie Parry, of Y Felinheli. One pocket ...

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Carew's astute miller

May 27, 2016

"Too good to be true," thought Thomas Ford of Carew tidal mill on receiving a free sample of "Improving Meal" in 1891. The company which had sent it claimed the substance ...

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In "Dic Loco" we trust

May 21, 2016

Would you board a train if you knew the driver was known as "Dic Loco"? Conwy Valley aluminium workers had no qualms about it, because the driver wasn't insane. Nicknames ...

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Holywell's mobile church bell

May 14, 2016

The best way to summon the people of Holywell to worship in the 18th century was to hang a church bell from the neck of a man who would walk the streets. The bell clanged with each ...

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Wales' first offender mugshots

May 6, 2016

Cameras are a common tool for law enforcement today, but when Carmarthen prison governor George Stephens began to photograph suspects in 1858 the concept ...

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Discover resort's roots on your mobile

Apr 30, 2016

Llandudno was a copper mining community before it became a seaside resort, and now you can use your smartphone to discover the fascinating history of Church Walks, which ...

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Anglesey's slipway to heaven

Apr 23, 2016

A slipway leading from land to water seems an unlikely facility for getting planes into the sky, but the ramp east of Beaumaris was originally built for flying ...

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Bard who laid out Central Park, NY

Apr 16, 2016

Poet Aneurin Jones ran the Halfway House in Pontllanfraith, Caerphilly, before emigrating to the USA, where he became superintendent of New York's parks. He helped to ...

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The night Tenby changed UK history

Apr 8, 2016

Tenby was one of Wales' busiest ports when a teenager called Henry Tudor evaded the authorities and slipped out to sea there one night in 1471. Had he been caught, the Tudor dynasty ...

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A pub for the poor by Conwy quay

Apr 4, 2016

When the Royal Oak Inn in Conwy lost its licence in 1899, the reasons included its use by "drunken women" and poor people. The appeal went all the way to the High Court in London, which ...

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VC hero's suicide in Newport

Mar 30, 2016

John Byrne was one of the first men to receive the Victoria Cross, back in the 1850s, but later he shot a colleague in Newport whom he believed had "insulted" the VC. When police ...

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Magnate's locally sourced church

Mar 23, 2016

When Lancashire cotton magnate James Ormrod built a church near Ruabon in memory of his wife, he sourced most of the materials from the local area. Sandstone quarried on his ...

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Penrhyn quarrymen's payday extra

Mar 18, 2016

Workers at the Penrhyn slate quarry, near Bethesda, used to knock off early on payday to walk to the central pay office, but after steam train technology arrived in the 1870s the pay packets ...

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Hero surgeon of Wind Street

Mar 12, 2016

The building which surrounds the Wind Street entrance to Salubrious Passage, Swansea, has a small inscription to note that surgeon Thomas Williams built it in 1803. He saved a teenage girl's life ...

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Thief took gold from police house

Mar 6, 2016

PC Gardner of Eglwysbach, Conwy Valley, returned from his beat one Sunday in 1887 to find that a burglar had stolen gold worth £8 from the village's police house, along with ...

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Hear anthem at writers' memorial

Feb 26, 2016

Anyone visiting the memorial in Pontypridd to the writers of the Welsh national anthem can now listen to the music on their mobiles and read a concise ...

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Inside the giant Anglesey abutment

Feb 19, 2016

The Anglesey abutment of Stephenson's Britannia Bridge looks like a solid mass of stone from the outside, but now smartphone users can scan QR codes ...

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Floating memorial to popular general

Feb 14, 2016

The statue of Sir William Nott in the centre of Carmarthen wasn't the only 3D depiction of the military leader to be made after his death in 1845. A ship owner paid tribute by naming a new ...

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'Husbands, beat your wives'

Feb 5, 2016

A Welsh text urging husbands to love their wives had deteriorated when Dr Samuel Johnson visited the church in Tremeirchion in 1774, so that it translated as: "Husbands, beat your wives". One of his ...

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Bees went to beekeeper's funeral

Jan 29, 2016

Beekeeper Huw Berry of Llanrwst, Conwy Valley, nearly had his funeral delayed - by a swarm of bees at the cemetery entrance. The bees later settled on the flowers ...

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Medieval lechery in Aberystwyth pews

Jan 22, 2016

When worshipping at St Padarn's Church, the 14th-century bard Dafydd ap Gwilym didn't always concentrate on the sermon, judging by a poem in which he describes ogling a female ...

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Rhyl park with two royal names

Jan 13, 2016

"The king is dead - long live the king!". That was the basis, it appears, of the naming policy for a new park in Rhyl in the 1930s. It was going to be dedicated to the new King Edward VIII ...

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Baa-d manners in a Llangefni shop

Jan 5, 2016

Livestock trader HD Jones often collected animals from the railway goods yard at Llangefni, Anglesey, and walked them through the town towards his farm. In the 1940s, a flock of sheep veered off ...

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Caerphilly man's baffling bequest

Dec 30, 2015

WE Williams of Pwllypant House, Caerphilly, bequeathed a modest fortune in 1870 - not to his relatives but to the wealthy Marquis of Bute, whom he barely knew! The ...

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A black Madonna and baby Jesus

Dec 24, 2015

If you've seen the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus portrayed on a card or in a nativity play this Christmas, they probably had porcelain skin. But both have dark brown skin in an icon which you can see inside ...

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Australia's first Welsh woman

Dec 12, 2015

Frances Williams of Whitford, Flintshire, was the first Welsh woman to be transported to Australia. She had made the mistake of stealing some items belonging to Thomas Pennant's ...

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Llandudno tram shelter name lives on

Dec 7, 2015

The unusual circular shelter at West Shore, Llandudno, is still known as the tram shelter, almost 60 years after the last tram departed for Colwyn Bay. But tram passengers were not ...

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Battle of the war memorial HiPoints

Dec 1, 2015

War memorials always dominate our list of Top 10 HiPoints in November, as readers use the QR codes and web pages to discover details of local war dead. So which ones got the most ...

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Swansea sailor's 41 days adrift

Nov 27, 2015

Evan Basil Davies was one of four men who survived 41 days in a ship's lifeboat off Africa during the Second World War, but he died in another torpedo attack ...

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Where the bodies are buried in Rhyl

Nov 21, 2015

How many of the people who enjoy a stroll through Morley Road Park in Rhyl are aware that dead bodies lie beneath them? The land was a cemetery from 1859 until there was no more room ...

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100 years since hospital ship loss

Nov 17, 2015

The Holyhead ferry SS Anglia was converted to a hospital ship in the First World War. The red crosses on its sides were no defence against the mine which sank it 100 years ago today ...

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Counting the arches in Crickhowell

Nov 12, 2015

Try counting the arches in Crickhowell's bridge over the Usk and you'll never get the same result on the upstream and downstream sides, even if you haven't been drinking ...

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Poppies on doors of Conwy war dead

Nov 10, 2015

Volunteers who researched the Conwy and Deganwy war memorials for HistoryPoints have placed poppies on the doors of 49 war dead. Each poppy has a card with the person's name and ...

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Merchant Navy sacrifice revealed

Nov 6, 2015

The Merchant Navy played a vital and risky role in the First and Second World Wars, and now the details of thousands of seamen who died in wartime are ...

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Dolgarrog dam disaster 90 years on

Nov 2, 2015

Today's fine weather could not be further removed from the stormy conditions which precipitated the Dolgarrog dam disaster on 2 November 1925. Ten adults and six children ...

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Remembering the flannel factory flood

Oct 30, 2015

When a dam broke at Cwmcarn, in the Gwent Valleys, in 1875 the resulting torrent was powerful enough to demolish the flannel factory where John Hunt and his family ...

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Mining town's pioneer church

Oct 21, 2015

The Church in Wales separated from Britain's established Anglican church in 1920, but another five years passed before it built its first church, in Llay, near Wrexham. The ...

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See our John's work in print

Oct 16, 2015

Thousands of people have enjoyed the words and photos of Llandudno historian John Lawson-Reay on HistoryPoints.org since 2012. Now many of the places ...

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Where Hitler's deputy drank in Wales

Oct 10, 2015

During the Second World War, customers at the Angel Hotel, Abergavenny, could sometimes spot Adolf Hitler's deputy enjoying a drink there. Rudolf Hess had flown from Germany ...

[More]

Not just any old Tin Shed

Oct 2, 2015

There's more to the former Jim Isaacs garage in Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, than meets the eye. Bob Berry serviced some of his bikes there while trying to break the world speed record ...

[More]

Butcher's 9 sons in First World War

Sep 25, 2015

100 years ago today, Llanrwst butcher's son Ivor Jones was killed in the Battle of Loos. He and his eight brothers set a Welsh record by serving in the First World War. The ...

[More]

Wreck survivor's cannibalism charge

Sep 18, 2015

A sailor from Moelfre, Anglesey, was lucky to be picked up alive by a passing ship after nine days in a lifeboat, but later he was tried for cannibalism. His own ship ...

[More]

Relic of Ebbw Vale's iron supremacy

Sep 10, 2015

The General Office building in Ebbw Vale is a grand statement of previous industrial might - and it should have been even bigger. The First World War interrupted ...

[More]

Conwy landlord's dry Sunday sin

Sep 5, 2015

An hotel landlord in Conwy was one of the first to be fined after boozing on Sundays was banned in Wales in 1881. Bona fide travellers were allowed to consume ...

[More]

Niches for knees

Aug 31, 2015

When you walk towards the impressively large church in Corwen, Denbighshire, look to your left to see gravestones with distinctive semicircular niches. Grieving relatives ...

[More]

Pit claimed 3 lives before it opened

Aug 22, 2015

The site of Cwmcarn Colliery's pithead is now a forest glade, but in 1876 it was a site of tragedy as the bodies of two men were removed from the embryonic shaft. They had ...

[More]

U-boat's wartime visits to Llandudno

Aug 14, 2015

One hundred years ago, a German submarine came right up to the shore of the Great Orme, Llandudno, on three successive nights to try to collect three officers who had escaped ...

[More]

Former doorway to higher education

Aug 11, 2015

The isolated portico of the old Penrhyn Arms Hotel makes an odd sight at the roadside in Bangor, but what makes this stonework special is that the University College ...

[More]

No man shall marry his granny

Aug 6, 2015

A large stone tablet at St Edmund's Church, Crickhowell, was inscribed in the 18th century with lists of people whom men and women couldn't marry, including their ...

[More]

The bardic black chair of 1876

Jul 23, 2015

The posthumous bardic chair for Hedd Wyn, killed in the First World War, was famously covered with a black cloth, but that was not the first time the National Eisteddfod ...

[More]

A palmist and a lovelorn governess

Jul 18, 2015

Madame Marriott, palmist at Cardiff's Royal Arcade, was embroiled in a sensational court case in 1904 after a Swiss governess threatened to kill the priest she had fallen in love ...

[More]

Discover graves of training-ship boys

Jul 12, 2015

In Llandegfan churchyard, Anglesey, are the graves of more than 30 boys who died while inmates of the industrial training ship HMS Clio. One was killed by bullies, some ...

[More]

Irish traitor's Welsh baptism

Jul 4, 2015

Sir Roger Casement, executed for treason in the First World War, was secretly baptised at the Roman Catholic church in Rhyl in 1868. His diplomatic ...

[More]

Valleys trader who saved battleship

Jun 29, 2015

To the residents of Cwmcarn, in the Gwent Valleys, Royden Jandrell was just an ordinary shopkeeper and family man. But before he settled into this quiet life, he won a medal ...

[More]

Steam to screen at Llandudno Junction

Jun 28, 2015

There was always plenty of animation at the site of the Cineworld multi-screen cinema in Llandudno Junction as  steam engines came and went ...

[More]

Waterloo celebrations cast in iron

Jun 21, 2015

Words cast into the arch of Waterloo Bridge, Betws-y-coed, record that the structure was constructed in the year of the Battle of Waterloo. The parts didn't arrive from ...

[More]

A taxing move for Customs office

Jun 15, 2015

When Pickfords turned up at the old Customs office in Cardiff Bay in 1993, they moved not just the contents but the entire building. It had taken a big lobbying ...

[More]

Welsh mill with two undershot wheels

Jun 10, 2015

Undershot waterwheels are rare in such a hilly country as Wales, but Marford Mill at Rossett, near Wrexham, has two of them, almost side by side. The mill was erected in ...

[More]

Village lost 5 men this day in 1915

Jun 6, 2015

Many people who visit the pretty village of Moelfre, Anglesey, pause to look at its war memorial. Now HistoryPoints enables them to discover that 5 of the 18 locals who died ...

[More]

Chapel at the roots of the Revival

Jun 1, 2015

Wales 110 years ago was gripped by a religious Revival which spread to five continents, and it all began when a former miner and blacksmith from Loughor, near ...

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Cinema pioneer's hall still stands

May 26, 2015

The building where early film-maker Arthur Cheetham used to entertain crowds with his moving pictures still stands in Rhyl town centre, although its historical ...

[More]

Where Lawrence of Arabia was born

May 19, 2015

HistoryPoints QR codes at TE Lawrence's birthplace near Porthmadog enable visitors to read his story on their mobiles in several languages, including Arabic. Today it's 80 years ...

[More]

Chapel's debt to the Rev James

May 13, 2015

James Buckley's face is familiar to Welsh beer drinkers from labels on bottles of "The Rev James" ale. Another of his legacies is a Powys chapel built in 1798 on ...

[More]

Sad tale of Lusitania stewardess

May 6, 2015

Cunard Line stewardess Mary Elizabeth Jones, of Llanfairfechan, was temporarily transferred from her usual ship to RMS Lusitania, shortly before the liner ...

[More]

Miller's son who heard Titanic SOS

May 5, 2015

The first person in Britain to learn that the Titanic was sinking was Artie Jones, a miller's son from Pontllanfraith, near Caerphilly. Locals brought batteries ...

[More]

MP couldn't stomach Lib-Con pact

Apr 28, 2015

A Liberal and Conservative coalition was a divisive issue in the 1918 general election, and Caernarfon-based MP Ellis Davies refused to back ...

[More]

Australian PM's Llandudno home

Apr 24, 2015

On Anzac Day every year the Australian flag is raised outside the former home in Llandudno of Billy Hughes, who became Prime Minister of Australia in 1915. Anzac Day recalls the start of ...

[More]

Murderer had bishop's sympathy

Apr 19, 2015

The Bishop of Llandaff was one of 30,000 people who petitioned for a reduced sentence for Newport murderer William Beavan. Beavan had killed his wife ...

[More]

Abergele Mormon's lucky escapes

Apr 13, 2015

Daniel Jones, a pioneering Mormon from Abergele, evaded multiple death threats in the USA after he was jailed with Joseph Smith, who is regarded as a prophet ...

[More]

Biggest man-made explosion

Apr 6, 2015

When two carts carrying liquid explosive blew up near Llanberis in 1869, the noise was heard as far away as Holyhead. It was probably the biggest man-made explosion ever ...

[More]

Taking the P at Salubrious Place?

Apr 1, 2015

Nobody knows how Swansea's Salubrious Place got its name, but an eminent local historian suggested long ago that it could have begun as an ironic name for a filthy ...

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A lifetime of transformation

Mar 27, 2015

Conwy sea captain John Jones, who died 150 years ago this month, witnessed his town's transformation during his 70 years. He was landlord of the Liverpool Arms ...

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Polymaths raised on remote farm

Mar 22, 2015

The Morris brothers of Anglesey were renowned in the 18th century for their multi-skilling, despite having grown up on a remote farm. Their father was a cooper ...

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Not much RIP for T Jones, Llantysilio

Mar 16, 2015

The coffin of Thomas Jones, of Llantysilio Hall, near Llangollen, was opened one night by people who hoped to find his will inside. He had died in 1820 without a direct descendant ...

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Where bubbles took their fizzicals

Mar 11, 2015

According to the ads, every bubble in Corona pop had passed its fizzical. The company's main factory in Porth, Rhondda, was a product of the Victorian temperance ...

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Prince of Wales' concern for footsore wife

Mar 9, 2015

When Prince Llywelyn Fawr and his wife Siwan stayed at their home near Llanrwst, Christian worship involved a steep walk to the local church and back. To save her ...

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Riches galore for Wrexham ostler

Mar 5, 2015

Fred Temple, former ostler at the Feathers Hotel in Wrexham, was living a vagabond's life when he learned in 1899 that he had inherited a fortune worth £66m in today's ...

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Suffragettes in Newport

Feb 26, 2015

Having being the scene of the tragic but ultimately successful Charist protest in 1839, Newport was an obvious place for suffragettes to seek support in ...

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Welshman's A-OK career at NASA

Feb 25, 2015

The success of the 1969 moon landings was partly down to the talents of Tecwyn Roberts, from the tiny Anglesey village of Llanddaniel-fab. He was a flight dynamics ...

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UK's oldest Pancake Day venue?

Feb 17, 2015

The Groes Inn, in the Conwy Valley, takes its name from Groesynyd - the cross of St Ynyd. He is traditionally celebrated in Wales on Shrove Tuesday, and ...

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Lament for Four Crosses station

Feb 13, 2015

This year marks the 50th anniversary of several controversial railway closures in Wales. Four Crosses station, in Powys, featured in a Flanders & Swann song lamenting ...

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Hirohito's Hiroshima escort

Feb 6, 2015

The Dean's Library in St Asaph has plenty of space for community activities, thanks to the Very Rev Raymond Renowden's clearout of old books in 1971. He had served ...

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Your super-connection to history

Feb 2, 2015

HistoryPoints is playing a part in making Cardiff a "super-connected city" by providing on-the-spot access to stories associated with dozens of buildings, structures and memorials. Free internet ...

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The shipwreck that kept on giving

Jan 28, 2015

When one of the world's most hi-tech ships, owned by New York's Macy family, sank off Harlech in January 1825, red American apples spilled from the hold. Apples were ...

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Newport family's double sub loss

Jan 26, 2015

Rugby player John Wallace Linton, son of a Newport architect, was awarded the Victoria Cross for his submarine heroics in the Second World War. His son William went ...

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Seaside home of young Paula Yates

Jan 22, 2015

When model and TV presenter Paula Yates was growing up at the Deganwy Castle Hotel, near Llandudno, she believed her father to be Jess Yates, a local ...

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Tram engines stopped 80 years ago

Jan 17, 2015

The unique box-shaped steam engines of the Glyn Valley Tramway stopped hauling passengers and stone in the Ceiriog Valley in 1935. The track ran so close to the road ...

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Gloating at Glyndŵr's losses?

Jan 16, 2015

A painting of St George slaying the dragon adorns a wall of Llangattock Lingoed church in Monmouthshire. Some believe it originally symbolised Owain Glyndŵr's defeat ...

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Confederate Army's Welsh woe

Jan 9, 2015

In stormy weather 150 years ago, a brand new ship belonging to the American Confederate Army sank near Prestatyn. The loss of life on the ship and a lifeboat may ...

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Victorian ladettes in Abergavenny

Jan 2, 2015

Drunken women in the streets aren't a modern phenomenon, and in 1877 a policeman had to use a wheelbarrow to take an engine driver's wife to the ...

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Going hungry in Wales in 1752

Dec 24, 2014

As we enjoy our Christmas feasts, it's worth remembering that many people in Wales came to the brink of starvation in winters past. In January 1752 a mob, mostly of women, forced ...

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Bethesda's plump pudding

Dec 21, 2014

The plum pudding is the heaviest part of any traditional Christmas dinner but few have ever rivalled the 2.5-ton weight of the pudding which brought some festive cheer ...

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Tortured RAF man remembered

Dec 20, 2014

Seventy years ago today, Arthur Banks of Llanddulas was killed after surviving days of torture in Italy. The young man was later awarded the George Cross for refusing to yield ...

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Lad who saved Barmouth Bridge

Dec 13, 2014

Directors of the Cambrian Railways company gave a lad called Owens a reward in 1893 for raising the alarm when Barmouth Bridge caught fire. The viaduct ...

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Bargoed war memorial unravelled

Dec 7, 2014

Bargoed war memorial, in the Rhymney Valley, lists the names of the First and Second World War dead in one combined list. Now you can discover when they died ...

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A month of remembrance

Dec 1, 2014

War memorials feature strongly in our list of Top 10 HiPoints for November. By Remembrance Sunday, HistoryPoints had featured 100 war memorials across ...

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Bible translators who saved Welsh

Nov 28, 2014

It's often said that the Bible's translation into Welsh saved the language from extinction, so the St Asaph memorial to eight men who were involved in ...

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Holyhead sailor's heroic plunge

Nov 21, 2014

Seaman Thomas Hughes, who was born 200 years ago, was on his ship in Holyhead when he saw a woman and her niece, aged 3, fall into the dock's deep water. He jumped ...

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Abergavenny's LNWR war dead

Nov 17, 2014

The London & North Western Railway lost 16 of its Abergavenny-area employees in the First World War. We have now added their details to our coverage of the town's ...

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Harbouring policemen in a pub

Nov 12, 2014

In 1903 the landlord of the Bull Inn, in the Conwy Valley, was taken to court for harbouring two police constables after closing time. The case was brought by the local superintendent ...

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100 war memorials on your mobile

Nov 8, 2014

Ever wondered where the people named on your local war memorial lived, when they died and how old they were? Now the answers come direct to your mobile as you ...

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Cardiff railmen's wartime sacrifice

Nov 4, 2014

Railway workers were exempt from conscription in the Second World War but in the First World War many enlisted and were wounded or killed. Plaques at Cardiff Central ...

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French privateers who cried 'Loup!'

Oct 29, 2014

The cannons outside Holyhead Maritime Museum were dumped overboard in 1710 by French privateers, who had kidnapped customs officers by ...

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Wanderer who knew 15 languages

Oct 27, 2014

Dic Aberdaron, whose grave is outside St Asaph parish church, led a nomadic life, accompanied by a cat and many books. "One quarter idiot, three-quarters genius” was ...

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Telescopic sites in Swansea

Oct 21, 2014

In its heyday as a port, Swansea had a dozen companies making chronometers and other nautical instruments, including telescopes. The Cousens family ...

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Wrexham's Yale University link

Oct 19, 2014

Elihu Yale's generosity wasn't confined to the American university which carries his name. He also gave several gifts to St Giles' Church, Wrexham, and was buried close to its ...

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Shrunk like Topsy at Porthmadog

Oct 13, 2014

Topsy, one of the world's first ever model railway locomotives to be powered by steam, is proudly displayed in Porthmadog, the town where an engineer used it ...

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English-medium worship in Risca

Oct 5, 2014

Risca lies in one of the most Anglicised areas of Wales, but in the early 1850s it was impossible for settlers from outside Wales to worship in a chapel where Welsh ...

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Anglesey academic's Indian mission

Sep 28, 2014

Helen Rowlands, of Menai Bridge, was such a brilliant academic that universities on three continents offered her chairs. She turned them all down to work with poor ...

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Misunderstandings at Swallow Falls

Sep 22, 2014

Many people who visit the beautiful Swallow Falls, near Betws-y-coed, want to know the name's origin, but it seems the story about it being mistranslated by English ...

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Get comedian's story, just like that

Sep 16, 2014

As it's 30 years since Tommy Cooper died on stage, literally,  many young people who see his statue in Caerphilly may find our QR codes useful to explain the fez ...

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Driving to Snowdon summit in 1904

Sep 11, 2014

110 years ago this month, motoring pioneer Sir William Letts drove an Oldsmobile to the summit of Snowdon in less than 90 minutes. He was also a founding member of the AA ...

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School sailing tragedy at Criccieth

Sep 3, 2014

On this day in 1951, residents of Criccieth were surprised to see a boat belonging to a Bedford school labouring on a choppy sea. The boat capsized at 2pm and no lifeboat ...

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So many ways to die at the pit

Aug 28, 2014

The miners' memorial in Llanbradach, Caerphilly, commemorates c.165 men who died in many accidents, and in many different ways. Startled pit ponies, falling roofs ...

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Hotelier's wartime tribulations

Aug 21, 2014

Llangollen hotelier Samuel Johnson had already seen nine of his 17 staff depart on First World War service when he tried, in vain, to get the hotel manager exempted ...

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German freighter's mystery woman

Aug 19, 2014

When the German freighter Rethi Muller ran aground at Penmaenmawr in 1967, rescuers were probably surprised to find themselves hauling a woman to safety by breeches ...

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Smashing ballroom in Abergavenny

Aug 17, 2014

The Swan Hotel in Abergavenny had a grand ballroom until new owners decided to rip out its supporting pillars, with predictable results. Another major change ...

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Llyn Padarn helicopter tragedy

Aug 12, 2014

It's 21 years since a helicopter, carrying teenage cadets, developed a fault and plunged into the lake at Llanberis, in full view of horrified holidaymakers. Three ...

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Wrexham claimed oldest cinema

Aug 10, 2014

Newsreel of Queen Victoria's funeral was among the clips screened on the opening night of Wrexham's Empire Music Hall. This gave rise later to a claim ...

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QRs for over 80 war memorials

Aug 4, 2014

The number of Welsh war memorials where you can get instant access to historical details on your mobile is still growing. More than 80 war memorials ...

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More Abergavenny FWW details

Jul 26, 2014

As the centenary of the start of the First World War approaches, we've delved into the records again to give readers more details of Abergavenny men who died ...

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Ffestiniog Railway station names

Jul 25, 2014

Dduallt, Tan-y-Bwlch and Penrhyndeudraeth are a puzzle to many of the people who ride the scenic Ffestiniog Railway each year, but now they can hear how to pronounce ...

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U-boat's secret visits to the Orme

Jul 16, 2014

Under cover of darkness, a German U-boat came right up to the cliffs of the Great Orme during the First World War - not once but on three consecutive nights. The ...

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Pub to chapel to pub in Aberystwyth

Jul 12, 2014

Methodists, who disapproved of booze, were delighted when an Aberystwyth pub was replaced with St Paul's Chapel -  the devil had made way for God. Now the ...

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Pubs named after commoners

Jul 9, 2014

On Sunday the Radio 4 programme Broadcasting House discussed the paucity of British pubs named after commoners, as opposed to nobility and ...

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June's Top 10 HiPoints

Jul 2, 2014

There's a wartime bias to the list of best-read HiPoint pages for June, with the 70th anniversary of D-Day bringing fresh interest in the story of the secret Mulberry harbour ...

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A view of Stone Age Llandudno

Jun 25, 2014

Thousands of people will have a seaside holiday in Llandudno this summer, but when the first humans arrived the sea was far away. The view from the Little Orme ...

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Giant limekiln in Powys

Jun 17, 2014

It's now 100 years since the 14-chamber Hoffman limekiln at Llanymynech ceased producing lime, but the walls and chimney are still well preserved. The kiln was ...

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Where Wales recalls its fallen

Jun 13, 2014

The story of the Welsh National War Memorial is now instantly available on mobile screens to people strolling past the monument in Cathays Park, Cardiff. The ...

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The last wolf in Wales

Jun 10, 2014

It's said that Coed y Bleiddiau, near Blaenau Ffestiniog, is where the last wolf in Wales was killed. Now you can see a living "wolf" of a different sort there - made of ...

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North Wales' D-Day secret

Jun 5, 2014

A top Nazi had to concede after the D-Day landings that the Germans' preparations for the onslaught were undermined by "an idea of simple genius", trialled in secret at Conwy ...

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Prayers to pictures in Swansea

Jun 3, 2014

Seamen came to Swansea in the 19th century from across the globe, and a small church near the South Dock gave them a refuge from toil and danger, regardless ...

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75 years since submarine tragedy

Jun 1, 2014

The submarine Thetis was packed with men when it began a day's testing on 1 June 1939. Various naval officers wanted to see the new technology ...

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History for kids on Llandudno prom

May 26, 2014

Families and school parties in Llandudno can now use mobiles to whet children's taste for history and discover some cool facts. The Children's QR Discovery Tour ...

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Devil's Bridge advocates

May 20, 2014

The narrow-gauge train ride from Aberystwyth has delighted countless tourists, but only because earlier schemes to build full-size railways to Devil's Bridge had ...

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Neath's unpopular policeman

May 16, 2014

The appointment of Neath's first policeman didn't go down well with the locals - who eventually dangled him over a bridge parapet until he promised to leave ...

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Tragic past of Llanberis lake boat

May 7, 2014

Many people have enjoyed a pleasant cruise on Snowdon Star, the resident cruise boat of Llyn Padarn, Llanberis. But it might never have come to Wales ...

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Airship worry for Llandudno police

May 2, 2014

When an airship came to Llandudno in the First World War, the local constabulary had reason to be nervous - of cigarettes. Local residents ...

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For Cardiff, see Gloucester

Apr 28, 2014

Clergy at St John the Baptist Church, in the centre of Cardiff, are appointed locally these days, but for most of the church's existence the key decisions ...

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Magazine focuses on HistoryPoints

Apr 24, 2014

The May 2014 edition of Family Tree magazine contains a four-page article about HistoryPoints, with some sample QR-code labels for readers ...

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Shipwrecked on arriving home

Apr 21, 2014

The Porthmadog schooner Owen Morris had spent seven months away from home, crossing the Atlantic twice, when it passed Criccieth in ...

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Crisps and a pint for my bull, landlord

Apr 18, 2014

A farmer in New Quay, Ceredigion, was so angry when the breathalyser arrived in 1967 that he rode his bull to the pub in protest. The bull went in ...

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Tonyrefail's Shanghai policeman

Apr 14, 2014

The letters SMP after the name of Harry Holtam on Tonyrefail war memorial would stump many of us, even if we're familiar with regimental initials. By scanning ...

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When Colwyn Bay was diamonds' best friend

Apr 10, 2014

Diamond polishing was vital to the war effort in the 1940s, and Colwyn Bay was the perfect place for it - well away from enemy bombers. Gerrit Wins fled from ...

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Children sing of giant pudding again

Apr 9, 2014

More than a century ago, children in Bethesda sang a gleeful song about a 2.5-ton Christmas pudding sent to the families of striking quarrymen by ...

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March's Top 10 HiPoints

Apr 4, 2014

The 16th-century Ancaster Square in Llanrwst, Conwy Valley, made its debut in our list of Top 10 HiPoints last month, as did Ye Olde Murenger House in ...

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Carways and Airways in Cardiff

Mar 31, 2014

Cars and plane tickets are affordable to the masses today, but when the Queen's and Royal Garage in Westgate Street, Cardiff, was built ...

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Sleeping car's seaside slumber

Mar 27, 2014

A railway carriage beside the Wales Coast Path in Ceredigion has been going nowhere for 83 years. It was built in 1905 as a sleeping car for the ...

[More]

Angelic puzzle of Caernarfon doorway

Mar 23, 2014

The sculpted figure of an angel above a door in the old walled town of Caernarfon is dated 1628, but the building itself is centuries ...

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Reel athleticism in Colwyn Bay

Mar 19, 2014

When two of Colwyn Bay's cinemas were under common ownership, only one projectionist was employed to keep the film reels turning. The Princess Cinema ...

[More]

Bridgend's hi-tech demo of 1790

Mar 17, 2014

The Spinning Jenny was the bee's knees when the Glamorgan Agricultural Society set up its model woollen mill in Bridgend in the ...

[More]

Lord didn't have mercy on Aber

Mar 12, 2014

Residents of Ceredigion have never forgiven Lord Beeching for shutting the railway from Aberystwyth to Lampeter and Carmarthen, but his name ...

[More]

Vicar's tithe-ing troubles in 1887

Mar 9, 2014

When the vicar of Llandrillo-yn-Rhos, near Colwyn Bay, rejected farmers' demands for relief from tithes (church taxes), one of his churches was burnt down, troops ...

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Newport's very own taxman

Mar 5, 2014

Drinkers at Ye Olde Murenger House who feel bitter about paying tax on booze should spare a thought for Newport's medieval residents, who ...

[More]

February's Top 10 HiPoints

Mar 1, 2014

The birthplace of the brothers who wrote the wartime hit Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Old Kit-Bag was one of the 10 most-often viewed HiPoint pages ...

[More]

Llangollen hotel's bloody history

Feb 26, 2014

The Hand Hotel in Llangollen gets its name from the red hand on the Myddelton family's crest, said to depict a bloodied hand. But real blood was spilt ...

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BBC focus on HistoryPoints

Feb 23, 2014

Our recent QR codes in Capel Curig, Snowdonia, were put in place under the watchful gaze of BBC journalist Huw Jenkins, and you can hear ...

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Swansea blitz victims remembered

Feb 19, 2014

Today is the anniversary of the start of the three-night blitz of Swansea in 1941. HistoryPoints has researched details of the people, almost 400 in total, who ...

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Bard's cheeky appeal to Dwynwen

Feb 14, 2014

Many have asked Dwynwen, patron saint of Welsh lovers, for romantic assistance, but one medieval bard asked her to help him marry someone else's wife. Dafydd ...

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Chicken cure for epilepsy

Feb 11, 2014

Epileptics carrying chickens used to beat a path to Llandegla, Denbighshire, when it was thought that the holy well of St Tegla ...

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Poet's seaside retreat

Feb 5, 2014

Dylan Thomas wrote many of his most important works - including the poem Do Not Go Gentle - while he and his family lived off ...

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January's Top 10 HiPoints

Feb 1, 2014

The world's longest place name was the subject of the best-viewed HiPoint page last month, after excellent media coverage of our ...

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A wee bit of pink in Llanrhos church

Jan 26, 2014

Pink glass is rare in medieval church windows but was sometimes made by mixing gold with urine, two materials at opposite ...

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Machine guns in the beer garden

Jan 22, 2014

Llandegla, on the moors west of Wrexham, may seem an unlikely place for an attempted Nazi invasion but the Crown Hotel's beer ...

[More]

Medieval filth in Cardiff

Jan 18, 2014

Today Golate is a respectable side street in Cardiff city centre, but the unusual name stems from its rather whiffy past. There's another clue in ...

[More]

When Bangor made room for Rubens

Jan 13, 2014

Children and BBC artists weren't Bangor's only wartime evacuees. More than 500 priceless paintings from the National Gallery in London ...

[More]

Avoidable sea tragedy in Pembs

Jan 8, 2014

Freshwater West is one of Wales' most beautiful beaches, but in spring 1943 it was littered with the bodies of soldiers and sailors ...

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December's Top 10 HiPoints

Jan 3, 2014 The sea defences at Towyn and the remarkable prehistoric trees of Borth Bog were two of the most popular topics for ... [More]

Church linked to Roman's dream

Dec 29, 2013

St Peblig's Church in Caernarfon is linked to Magnus Maximus' dream of a beautiful woman who lived in an area of mountains ...

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Christmas massacre in Abergavenny

Dec 22, 2013

Accepting an invitation to Christmas dinner at Abergavenny Castle wasn't, in hindsight, the best decision Seisyll ap Dyfnwal made. He ...

[More]

See dead trees from prehistory

Dec 16, 2013

Timber rots when exposed to water, right? Not if it's at Borth (in Ceredigion) or Rhyl. Near both of those places, the ground ...

[More]

High Court saved the Vaynol Arms

Dec 11, 2013

One of the most fascinating old buildings in the walled town of Caernarfon dates from c.1507 but was almost pulled down in 1995. It took ...

[More]

Children's refuge from Spanish war

Dec 7, 2013

Caerleon is a long way from Spain's Basque country, which was just as well when the Basques were being bombed in ...

[More]

Shocking hospitality for wreck survivor

Dec 6, 2013

The last man hanged at Ruthin courthouse is thought to be an Irish priest who survived shipwreck off Pembrokeshire in 1678 while ...

[More]

HistoryPoints on the airwaves

Dec 4, 2013 In case you missed the item about HistoryPoints on BBC Radio Wales' Roy Noble Programme last Sunday, here's a ... [More]

War memorials in November Top 10

Dec 2, 2013

The surge of interest in our war memorial coverage around Armistice Day pushed memorials in Rhyl and Neath into November's ...

[More]

Punk v carols clash in Caerphilly

Nov 28, 2013 When the Sex Pistols were allowed to play at Caerphilly's Castle Cinema in December 1976, the audience was ... [More]

Source of Conwy Castle's stones

Nov 27, 2013

The magnificent castle and town walls in Conwy were built in the 13th century, but where did the large amounts of stone ...

[More]

The Flying Fox who funded a hospital

Nov 22, 2013

The depiction of a fox in flight at the top of the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Rhyl refers to the Duke of Westminster's ...

[More]

Clock was 525,600 minutes slow

Nov 20, 2013

Generations have used Machynlleth's landmark town clock for accurate time, but it was a year late initially. It was planned to mark the coming ...

[More]

An echo of Cardiff's Viking past

Nov 17, 2013

Womanby Street in central Cardiff may sound feminine, but "womanby" has its origins in the Old Norse for houndsman, or ...

[More]

Wales' oldest shop?

Nov 12, 2013

Timber from Siop Clwyd, Denbigh, has been dated to 1533. The building was erected partly on what was then the market ...

[More]

40+ war memorials on your phone

Nov 11, 2013

Here's an Armistice Day update on our work to improve access to information on war memorials. Details of thousands of people who...

[More]

A ton was no Uphill task for Malcolm

Nov 9, 2013

The Malcolm Uphill pub in Caerphilly honours a sporting hero whose devotion to motorcycling led to him breaking a key record ...

[More]

Pirates foiled by moving cliffs

Nov 6, 2013

When pirates from Lundy Island spotted St Govan on Pembrokeshire's south coast, their eyes lit up with the 6th century equivalent of ...

[More]

October's Top 10 HiPoints

Nov 1, 2013 A quaint Arts & Crafts seaside cottage for a retired sea captain made its debut in our Top 10 last month. Whitefriars ... [More]

Businessman's sad trip to the Palace

Oct 31, 2013

A Llandudno furniture retailer went to Buckingham Palace in 1945, to collect the Military Cross awarded posthumously to ...

[More]

When Ponty had news on the Rialto

Oct 25, 2013

The Rialto bridge in Venice was thought to have the longest span in Europe until someone pointed out that Pontypridd's bridge ...

[More]

Thatch'll do nicely in Wrexham

Oct 19, 2013 The government gave special protection to the thatched roof of the Horse & Jockey pub in Wrexham town centre ... [More]

Arts & Crafts homes by the seaside

Oct 9, 2013 Llanfairfechan, between Bangor and Conwy, has a remarkable collection of buildings in the Arts & Crafts style, most ... [More]

Basket cases in Abergavenny

Oct 8, 2013

Naughty schoolboys in Abergavenny didn't get lines or detention but were placed in a basket and hauled up to the rafters for the rest of ...

[More]

September's Top 10 HiPoints

Oct 1, 2013 Gossip about actress Catherine Zeta Jones helped to push our page about The Hancock, her family's local pub in ... [More]

Words of windows at Cardiff Bay

Sep 29, 2013 The upper windows of the Wales Millennium Centre, spelling out words in Welsh and English, are an iconic feature ... [More]

Snooker star Fred's home by the sea

Sep 27, 2013

In the year that he won the world snooker championship for the first time, Fred Davis bought an hotel on Llandudno seafront ...

[More]

Tenby RAF memories saved in time

Sep 21, 2013

One of the last things Clifford Burkett did was write down his memories of Tenby's wartime rescue base for HistoryPoints. He died ...

[More]

St Asaph's musical heritage revealed

Sep 20, 2013 If you're in St Asaph for the North Wales International Musical Festival, be sure to take a smartphone or tablet and ... [More]

Last stop for Taff Vale Railway sprawl

Sep 16, 2013 Cardiff Bay station is the last survivor of the sea of tracks laid in the central docklands area by the Taff Vale Railway ... [More]

Bishop's flowing tribute to his wife

Sep 12, 2013

When Thomas Vowler Short, Bishop of St Asaph, decided to commemorate his late wife, he splashed the cash on a water ...

[More]

Abergavenny's turbulent past

Sep 8, 2013 Today Abergavenny is a genteel town, but our new "Law and Disorder" QR tour lifts the lid on its turbulent past ... [More]

Defence of the Tudor realm

Sep 5, 2013 Walkers on the coast path west of Angle, Pembrokeshire, pass a ruined wall on a clifftop. Many may not realise ... [More]

August's Top 10 HiPoints

Sep 2, 2013 Our web page about the 1947 Mumbles lifeboat memorial at Sker Point was our most-read HiPoint page last ... [More]

Trains gone by at Prestatyn

Aug 28, 2013

Prestatyn's original railway station building, superseded in 1897, was derelict for many years but has now been carefully restored ...

[More]

Cardiff's avenue of 'smelly trees'

Aug 25, 2013 Ginkgo biloba is an ancient tree species which grows in China, and one of the best places to see it in Britain is Bute ... [More]

See the paintings you can't see!

Aug 22, 2013

Historic paintings adorn the interior of the Institute Building in Caernarfon, but the public rarely gets to see them. Now anyone can scan ...

[More]

Shipwreck showed Cardi generosity

Aug 17, 2013 Ceredigion residents are stereotyped as misers, but when a collection was held in Aberystwyth in 1861 for the ... [More]

The Brown Bomber in Bangor

Aug 13, 2013 American boxer Joe Louis was world heavyweight champion when the Second World War began. He enlisted and ... [More]

Mumbles lifeboat memorial QRs

Aug 6, 2013 If you've walked along the Wales Coast Path at Sker Point, Bridgend, you probably didn't realise there's a memorial ... [More]

Our top 10 HiPoints in July

Aug 3, 2013

The tiny, remote church at Pistyll,on the Llŷn Peninsula, was our most-read HiPoint last month, partly because of Prince Charles' visit early in ...

[More]

Birthplace of King Henry VII

Jul 28, 2013 After the popularity of our web page about the site of Henry Tudor's landing in Pembrokeshire, the birthplace of the ... [More]

Wartime home of Mrs Mopp

Jul 26, 2013 One of the most popular radio shows of the 1940s, It's That Man Again, was broadcast in wartime from Penrhyn ... [More]

Where Glyndŵr entered Abergavenny

Jul 24, 2013 It's said that a local woman let Owain Glyndŵr's rebel army into Abergavenny through a postern gate in the ... [More]

Wilf Wooller's humble birthplace

Jul 20, 2013 Wilf Wooller, who excelled at rugby, cricket, squash and soccer, got a foot on the sporting ladder at Cambridge ... [More]

Progenitor of Cardiff's arcades

Jul 15, 2013 The Royal Arcade in Cardiff was the first of the city's full-scale shopping arcades - built so early that slum housing ... [More]

Full circle for Llanrwst's clock

Jul 14, 2013 A market hall topped by a clock and gilt eagle was a feature of Ancaster Square, Llanrwst, until the 1960s, when ... [More]

Diamond geezers in Bangor

Jul 9, 2013 Diamonds weren't forever in Bangor, only for the Second World War - when a diamond polishing factory was ... [More]

Barrage of criticism begat wetlands

Jul 7, 2013 Plans to build a barrage in Cardiff Bay were criticised because the impounded water would permanently cover ... [More]

Royals give rural HiPoint a lift

Jul 3, 2013 A visit by Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall explains why our web page about a tiny rural church ... [More]

June's best read HiPoint pages

Jul 1, 2013

Cardiff accounted for half of our Top 10 HiPoint pages last month, but the Marble Church in Denbighshire, at the opposite end of Wales, took ...

[More]

Shipshape and Machen fashion

Jun 27, 2013 The Art Deco interior of the White Hart Inn at Machen, Caerphilly, is surprisingly opulent for a country pub. The ... [More]

The lost rail station of Llanberis

Jun 25, 2013 Many people board trains at Llanberis, for the ride up Snowdon or around the lake, but the original station takes ... [More]

The first Welsh-medium overspill

Jun 20, 2013 When the first Welsh-medium secondary school was established in Rhyl in 1956, it soon outgrew its space ... [More]

Get the bear-faced truth in Cardiff

Jun 18, 2013 The sight of a preserved bear in the window of a tobacconist's shop in Cardiff's Wyndham Arcade stops many ... [More]

Conwy anchor update

Jun 14, 2013 Our page on the dramatic rescue commemorated by the anchor near Conwy quay has been viewed hundreds ... [More]

Zulu - the facts and the artefacts

Jun 11, 2013 The former armoury at Brecon Barracks, dating back to 1805, now houses a Zulu War room where you can learn ... [More]

Milling around in St Dogmaels

Jun 9, 2013 The water mill at St Dogmaels, Pembrokeshire, existed in the 1640s and may have been founded much earlier ... [More]

Tragic end of Bachelor's Baby

Jun 6, 2013

Near the Wales Coast Path above Penmaenmawr is a rocky scar where an American bomber, named Bachelor's Baby...

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A peek into Bute Park's past

Jun 4, 2013 The park outside Cardiff Castle has a fascinating history, which you can now read in concise texts as you stroll ... [More]

Top 10 HiPoints in May

Jun 3, 2013 The dramatic war memorial at Aberystwyth heads our list of the HiPoint pages which were viewed most often in ... [More]

Government salutes war research

Jun 1, 2013 Adrian Hughes, one of our most avid contributors, has won a Welsh Government prize for his research on the ... [More]

Henry Tudor's mobile blackspot?

May 30, 2013

The story of Henry Tudor's landing at Mill Bay in 1485 was too good for us to resist. We knew connecting to the internet by mobile phone ...

[More]

Where rugby women changed

May 29, 2013 When Cardiff and Newport assembled women's rugby teams for a match in 1917, the Cardiff Arms Park changing rooms were ... [More]

A Pont of view in Aberystwyth

May 25, 2013 Pont Trefechan, where the Wales Coast Path crosses the Rheidol in Aberystwyth, was blocked to traffic 50 years ... [More]

Lifting the lid on a seafaring past

May 22, 2013 It's hard to imagine any sort of ship at Porthmadog today, but in bygone times the harbour was thronged with ... [More]

New feature - Top 10 HiPoints

May 19, 2013 The beautiful Marble Church in Bodelwyddan, West Lodge in Cardiff's Bute Park and the ancient Discoed yew ... [More]

Airman's Alpine navigation feat

May 15, 2013 Seventy years ago, a Llandudno airman received a medal after bringing a crippled RAF bomber from Italy to England ... [More]

An Animal Wall quiz in Cardiff

May 9, 2013 If you've ever visited Cardiff, you'll know about the Animal Wall outside the castle, but do you know what each ... [More]

Where leylandii have their roots

May 7, 2013 Near Welshpool, the Offa's Dyke Path passes the Leighton estate, where the Leyland cypress originated by chance  ... [More]

Resort's Victorian jewels on your phone

May 4, 2013

Llandudno Victorian Extravaganza wlil attract crowds to the Queen of Welsh Resorts this weekend, and we've created a QR tour ...

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Pretty lifeboat station's tragic past

May 1, 2013 St Davids lifeboat station is one of the most picturesque in Britain, but the area it covers includes unusually  ... [More]

Conwy ghosts in Chinese! 鬼在康威

Apr 25, 2013

Chinese visitors to Conwy can now discover the town's spooky side with the Mandarin version of our Conwy Ghosts & Legends tour. The ...

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Wrexham's towering Wonder

Apr 18, 2013

The great tower of St Giles' Church, Wrexham, is still an imposing landmark today, but as it's nearly 500 years old ...

[More]

The bay that launched a dynasty

Apr 15, 2013 Mill Bay in Pembrokeshire is a secluded spot - which is why Henry Tudor landed there in 1485 with a small but ... [More]

A stranded Dolphin in Llanymynech

Apr 12, 2013 The border town of Llanymynech is about as far as you can get in Wales from the sea, so the Dolphin Inn is an odd ... [More]

Pier pressure in Bangor

Apr 5, 2013

Garth Pier, Bangor, is one of Britain’s most unspoilt Victorian piers, but in the 1970s it was scheduled for …

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Bishops’ home from home

Apr 2, 2013

Abergwili, near Carmarthen, was an odd place for the Bishop of St Davids to reside, being so far from St Davids …

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Where Land Girls took a breather

Apr 1, 2013

An American fund-raising campaign in the Second World War enabled members of the Women’s Land …

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Devolution embodied in cedar and glass

Mar 28, 2013

The Senedd in Cardiff Bay is more than a striking modern building – it’s the embodiment of decades of …

[More]

Oldest international soccer ground

Mar 28, 2013

The Racecourse stadium is best known as the home of Wrexham FC, but it’s also the world’s oldest …

[More]

Tuns of history in Chepstow

Mar 22, 2013

The Three Tuns Inn in Chepstow looks steeped in history, and that’s before you see the ancient faggot oven …

[More]

A Swansea pub's whopping pump

Mar 19, 2013 Every pub has its pumps but the original one at Swansea's Pumphouse bar towered above the Waterfront. It provided ... [More]

Late and over budget in Llandudno

Mar 12, 2013 We're used to public building projects suffering legal wrangles and delays, but that's not new. In 1894 a town hall ... [More]

Bangor's finished unfinished tower

Mar 8, 2013 The great architect Sir George Gilbert Scott envisaged a majestic tower for St Deiniol's Cathedral, Britain's oldest ... [More]

Castle hassle in Kenfig

Mar 1, 2013 Kenfig Castle isn't one of the Welsh castles you'll see on posters and tea towels - because it's buried by sand dunes. It ... [More]

'Wartime in Llandudno' QR tour

Feb 24, 2013 The Inland Revenue, MI5, the Royal Artillery, Women's Land Army, US Army and Home Guard are just some of ... [More]

Killed for wanting secret ballots

Feb 21, 2013 Votes for all men, secret ballots and salaries for MPs are taken for granted today, but at least 22 people were shot dead ... [More]

Acting the part in Rhyl

Feb 19, 2013 The UK's first theatre built specially for children has shaped the future of a Hollywood director, university professors ... [More]

Billy, Taffy and Shenkin - no kidding

Feb 16, 2013 Millions of people have seen the white goat mascot on TV before Welsh rugby internationals, but why a goat? The ... [More]

When Wrexham said balls to rugby

Feb 8, 2013 When southerners decided in 1876 that Wales' new national football team should play rugby, soccer-playing lawyer ... [More]

Good deeds in Goodwick

Feb 6, 2013 Walkers have school pupils to thank for easy rail access to the Wales Coast Path in north Pembrokeshire. The ... [More]

The RAF's albatross

Feb 3, 2013 The RAF's insignia doesn't sport an eagle, Llandudno resident Charles Pepper insisted. He should have known ... [More]

Where Great Train Robbers supped

Jan 31, 2013 Five drinkers at the Three Tuns, Hay-on-Wye, in 1963 looked strangely familiar. That's because they were on the run ... [More]

Great saves of Llanberis

Jan 29, 2013 When he wasn't saving quarrymen's lives, surgeon Robert Mills-Roberts was making saves on the football field ... [More]

Triumph and tragedy at Pendine

Jan 25, 2013 The racing car Babs, once holder of the world land-speed record, is the centrepiece of the Museum of Speed ... [More]

The King's Arms - for all to see

Jan 24, 2013 It's not hard to work out why the King's Arms in Abergavenny is so named. A giant King Charles II coat of arms still ... [More]

This ancient tree will amaze yew

Jan 19, 2013 The centre of a yew in Llangernyw was an ideal place for an oil tank, until experts said the tree was 4,000 years ... [More]

Beatles, Quo and Stones by the sea

Jan 15, 2013 Not many places in Wales have resounded to live music by The Beatles, Status Quo and the Rolling Stones ... [More]

Psst! There's a chapel in our attic

Jan 12, 2013 Abergavenny's Pot & Pineapple shop seems to be in an ordinary building, but in the 17th century its owner took ... [More]

Brunel bulldozed our village

Jan 8, 2013 Legendary engineer IK Brunel didn't do things in half measures. When he decided that Neyland should be the ... [More]

Ship ahoy, in the middle of Cardiff

Jan 5, 2013 The Ship on Launch may seem an odd name for a pub near Cardiff Arms Park, a long way from the docks. But ... [More]

Smallest church in the British Isles

Jan 4, 2013 Britain's smallest house is one of our most famous HiPoints, but we've also put QR codes at the smallest church ... [More]

Copper load of this in Swansea

Jan 3, 2013 Boat-owners have enjoyed mooring in Swansea Marina for the past 31 years, but not all may realise the facility ... [More]

Happy news year

Jan 3, 2013 2013 got off to a flying start for HistoryPoints with international media coverage yesterday. Our thanks to everyone ... [More]

Lady, your train awaits your carriage

Dec 30, 2012 Whenever Lady Erskine took the train to Chester from the new Colwyn railway station, everyone aboard had to wait ... [More]

A window for each day

Dec 23, 2012 The offices of the Barry Dock Railway were designed to broadcast the success of Britain's largest integrated ... [More]

From Stalag Luft III to Pistyll

Dec 17, 2012 The grave of actor Rupert Davies, best known for playing the detective Maigret on TV, is in a secluded ... [More]

Sir Anthony's first rehearsal

Dec 12, 2012 Sir Anthony Hopkins is one of Hollywood's greatest stars, but in 1955 he was just a teenager at a loose end ... [More]

Record-breaking record shop

Dec 8, 2012 Never mind the era of vinyl - wax phonograph cylinders were the order of the day when Spillers Records ... [More]

We love lave nets

Dec 3, 2012

Fishermen in Monmouthshire are keeping alive the ancient tradition of catching fish with lave nets, shaped ...

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Monks kicked out, 250 years early

Nov 26, 2012 Many abbey churches became parish churches after monastery dissolution in 1536, but the monks of Aberconwy ... [More]

Canadian war graves explained

Nov 19, 2012 The rural setting of St Margaret's Church, Bodelwyddan, isn't where you'd expect to find more than 80 war graves ... [More]

QR codes on the Severn Bridge

Nov 12, 2012 We've previously featured many bridges on HistoryPoints, but none as big as the Severn Bridge. As well as being ... [More]

Rearing 15 children in a cave

Nov 9, 2012 The memorial to "Ted yr Ogof" on Llandudno promenade means little to the crowds of visitors who pass, but now ... [More]

Flattery got Milford Haven nowhere

Nov 4, 2012 Emma Hamilton, wife of Milford Haven's founder, had already borne Lord Nelson's child when the naval hero ... [More]

More exposure for our WCP Tour

Oct 30, 2012 Visitors to the official Wales Coast Path website are being informed about the HistoryPoints QR codes which ... [More]

QRs for each Welsh lifeboat station

Oct 24, 2012 Each of the 31 lifeboat stations in Wales has its history of courage, and sometimes tragedy, and now anyone ... [More]

Anne Boleyn's lady-in-waiting

Oct 21, 2012 One of the fascinating memorials at St Mary's Priory Church, Chepstow, is an effigy of Elizabeth Browne, who was ... [More]

Remembering the Thetis 100

Oct 18, 2012 There's no memorial in Moelfre, Anglesey, to the 99 men who died when the new submarine HMS Thetis ... [More]

A Scandinavian haven in Wales

Oct 11, 2012 The church where children's author Roald Dahl was christened had fallen into disrepair when a trust ... [More]

Flour power in Fairbourne

Sep 30, 2012 The tiny steam trains of the Fairbourne Railway wouldn't be there were it not for the McDougall flour ... [More]

Honesty and dishonesty in Mostyn

Sep 23, 2012 The Lletty Hotel in Mostyn was once renowned for the honesty of the Englishman who built it then vanished ... [More]

The ship that copied the Titanic

Sep 16, 2012 The Titanic disaster was fresh in everyone's minds when Y Gestiana started its maiden voyage over the ... [More]

Learn as you pedal

Sep 9, 2012 If you're planning to cycle long-distance in Wales, don't forget your smartphone because our new QR tours ... [More]

Une centaine de pages HistoryPoints!

Aug 31, 2012

French-speaking visitors to Wales can now read 100 HistoryPoints pages in French, thanks to the ...

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"Brains on toast" anyone?

Aug 30, 2012 Follow our new "Dig for Victory" QR tour around Colwyn Bay and you'll discover how Britain's entire food ... [More]

The not-so-popular poplars

Aug 23, 2012 The black poplar is among Britain's rarest native trees, and St Asaph has one of the biggest groups. Once the ... [More]

A devil of a job in Cerrigydrudion

Aug 18, 2012 The only way to get the devil out of St Mary Magdalen's church was to get a pretty young woman to ... [More]

Making movies in the Co-op

Aug 14, 2012 On Sunday evenings you can buy food at the Co-op in Rhos-on-Sea, but in the 1930s silent movies were filmed ... [More]

Betws-y-Coed's war dead recognised

Aug 11, 2012 The names of the people from the Betws area who died in the world wars are hidden from the sight of the ... [More]

A pint beside the "hanging tower"

Aug 7, 2012 Caernarfon's Anglesey Arms is haunted, say people who have stayed the night. No surprise there, because ... [More]

How's bat for endurance?

Aug 5, 2012 Wildlife experts were astonished in 2001 when a greater horseshoe bat was found in an old mine ... [More]

Now you can phone hymn

Aug 1, 2012 The chip shop on Beach Road, Bangor, is the birthplace of a noted composer of rousing Welsh hymns ... [More]

Drinking a bottle of milk underwater

Jul 26, 2012 ... was all in a day's work for Walter Beaumont, who held world records and performed stunts in a glass ... [More]

The Welsh cliff mystery

Jul 20, 2012 One of 1909's most sensational news stories, in Britain and New York, started with a luxury car teetering ... [More]

A ferry unusual sight

Jul 15, 2012 You can't miss the Duke of Lancaster if you walk the Flintshire section of the Wales Coast Path. It's a ... [More]

A multi-storey too soon

Jul 11, 2012 When two enterprising brothers built Llandudno's first multi-storey car park in the 1930s, they overlooked that ... [More]

One little tern deserves another

Jul 7, 2012 Every summer Gronant dunes, near Prestatyn, are home to one of Britain's biggest breeding colonies of ... [More]

Birthplace of RAF mountain rescue

Jul 2, 2012 It's comforting to know the RAF will airlift us from the mountains if we get into big trouble, and it all started ... [More]

Where the 'wild cars' were

Jun 27, 2012 Long before dodgems were invented, quarrymen used to travel to work on contraptions called ... [More]

A goldsmith's hallmark in Llanrwst

Jun 23, 2012 Even today it's commonly assumed that Llanrwst's almshouses were built by the major local ... [More]

Never a doll moment in Pen

Jun 19, 2012 Today it looks like an ordinary house, but in the 1950s Penholm was a thriving doll factory which ... [More]

Typing to the 'talkies'

Jun 14, 2012 The Cosy Cinema in Colwyn Bay was so small and cosy that the secretary in the architect's office above ... [More]

Four peaks, but which one is Snowdon?

Jun 10, 2012 The view of Snowdon and its neighbours from the A5 near Plas y Brenin is one of the most ... [More]

Centuries of swearing at Llanrwst

Jun 6, 2012 The fine old bridge at Llanrwst has long been known as the swearing bridge because ... [More]

Today Pen-y-Gwryd, tomorrow Everest

Jun 1, 2012 Climbers always want to go higher, so it's not surprising that the first men to reach the summit of Everest ... [More]

Where Maggie chose politics

May 31, 2012 Llandudno can take the credit or the blame for Margaret Thatcher deciding to enter politics. She was ... [More]

Left high and dry in Conwy

May 27, 2012 Today's frequent Conwy river cruises never run out of space for passengers, but in the heyday ... [More]

Inconsiderate parking delays QRs

May 22, 2012 We apologise for the late arrival of QR barcodes at Penmaen Head, but the shipwreck in April ... [More]

History of a concrete wall

May 20, 2012 Concrete walls don't usually merit a HistoryPoints plaque, but the one behind Knightly's Fun Park ... [More]

Circuit des fantômes et légendes

May 17, 2012 All the information on our popular Ghosts & Legends Tour of Conwy is now available in French, thanks ... [More]

From live Mozart to recorded Mozart

May 15, 2012 The HMV shop in Llandudno's Mostyn Street sells all kinds of recorded music, but when this building was new ... [More]

We're now on track, literally

May 13, 2012 The Great Orme tramcars have been ferrying people to the summit for over a century. Now passengers ... [More]

Putting girl power in the picture

May 9, 2012 When female artists weren't allowed in to Wales' main art institution, they hit back by opening their own ... [More]

Follow our Wales Coast Path Tour

May 4, 2012 The pioneering Wales Coast Path officially opens tomorrow, and we've arranged QR codes at 37 ... [More]

Welcome to our Chinese visitors

May 2, 2012 Britain is welcoming growing numbers of Chinese visitors, and now we're doing our bit to ... [More]

Shiver me timbers at the Cottage Loaf

Apr 25, 2012 The shipwreck near Llanddulas this month was unusual, but at one time there were so many wrecks along ... [More]

The Black Lion is older than you thought

Apr 14, 2012 History books about Conwy will tell you the former Black Lion Inn was built in 1589, as it says over the door. But ... [More]

Russian, our seventh language

Apr 9, 2012 The historic community orchard in Conwy is our first HiPoint where information is available in Russian. Thanks ... [More]

Remembering the hero of the Titanic

Apr 4, 2012 Deganwy-born Harold Lowe was an officer on RMS Titanic when the liner sank 100 years ago. Afterwards he was ... [More]

See what Turner saw today

Mar 30, 2012 The painter JMW Turner painted Conwy Castle from the west c.1800. Now you can download his painting ... [More]

War dead acknowledged at last

Mar 28, 2012 Conwy's cenotaph has never displayed the names of the local war dead, but now a HistoryPoints ... [More]

Pen yr hell do you say that?

Mar 22, 2012 Pen yr Helgi Du and Pen Llithrig y Wrach aren't the easiest mountain names to pronounce, unless ... [More]

A medical probe into the paranormal

Mar 12, 2012 Ghost experts warned the occupants of Conwy's Compton House never to open ... [More]

Tarantula alert in Llandudno Junction

Mar 2, 2012 Today the old banana warehouse in Llandudno Junction is full of antiques, but in the olden days scary spiders were... [More]

Our oldest HiPoint yet, 450 million years ago

Feb 22, 2012 HiPoints normally relate to the last few centuries, but now we've added one for a site that dates back 450 million ... [More]

Wales' first round of golff?

Feb 16, 2012 The Celtic Manor, near Newport, was in the international spotlight when it hosted the last Ryder Cup ... [More]

Why would anyone go to "the Killer" to relax?

Feb 7, 2012 They do in Llandudno Junction, and have been ... [More]

Where you wouldn't want to smell vanilla

Feb 5, 2012 We all like the smell of vanilla, but it's not such a pleasant aroma ... [More]

Two days old and bilingual already

Feb 1, 2012

We're now online in two languages. Information about the RCA art gallery in Conwy is now available in Welsh as well as English. We hope to add other languages for selected HiPoints in the future. In some cases, the information will be tailored to people who read in that language. The next bit is in Welsh, by the way: Pe hoffech ddarllen yn y Gymraeg, cliciwch lle gwelwch:link to Welsh translation


History in the making in Conwy

Jan 31, 2012 At HistoryPoints.org we're used to dealing with facts from the distant past, but here we have a rare chance to record an event that happened today. The Albion pub, missed by some Conwy residents after it closed in 2010, reopened today, with its original 1920s features restored to their original appearance by a unique group of four breweries. We're raising a glass by adding The Albion to our HiPoints in Conwy.

We're up and running

Jan 30, 2012

We've now launched the HistoryPoints website. Thanks to the guys at the RCA art gallery, Ye Olde Mail Coach, the Malt Loaf and other venues who took part in our test this month.