Former Danygraig Arms, 159-160 Broadway, Trefforest
The World of Groggs occupies the former Danygraig Arms. The pub was built c.1880 on the site of an earlier hostelry known as the Griffin’s Head or Griffin Inn, seen on the left in the top photo.
Broadway was then called Tram Road, and the buildings’ address was “Tram Road Side”. An industrial tramroad (early form of railway) still ran along the street in the 1870s, connecting collieries in Pontypridd to ironworks and smithies in Treforest. In the 1860s the Griffin Inn was kept by Watkin William Wynn, who was also a builder. He went bankrupt in 1869.
In 1895 there were nine recorded cases of typhoid in Trefforest, including one at the Danygraig Arms.
Samuel Bowditch was the Danygraig Arms licensee in 1908, when he sued the Welsh Hills Aerated Water Company of Porth (later the Corona pop company) for £40 damages. He and a friend were thrown from a horse-drawn trap on the Llantwit road when they met the company’s steam traction engine coming the other way. Samuel alleged that one of the three trailers behind the engine swerved towards his horse, causing damage to the animal and trap and injuring the occupants. A witness said the trailer had swerved the other way and the case was thrown out.
Two years later, Samuel was a defendant, accused by the Inland Revenue of omitting to record substantial quantities of spirits in the Danygraig Arms stock book. He was fined £2 and had to pay costs.
Cyril McElligott, an excavator driver, ran the pub in the 1950s. He had been Mentioned in Despatches for his bravery in the Second World War and had received a Royal Humane Society testimonial for saving a boy from drowning. In 1958 Cyril, aged 38, was fined and banned from driving for a year for drink-driving in his sports car.
The middle photo, courtesy of David Beilby, shows the Danygraig Arms with a Pontypridd Urban District Council bus approaching in September 1963.
The pub closed c.1969. It was in poor condition when John and Pamela Hughes bought it in 1971 as their family home and premises for their growing Groggs pottery business – click here for our page about Groggs. The lowest photo shows the building in 1971, newly branded as the John Hughes Gallery.
Postcode: CF37 1BH View Location Map
Website of the World of Groggs
David Beilby’s transport gallery – including historic photos of Pontypridd buses
Footnotes: Griffin Inn and Danygraig Arms licensees/landlords
1858 - John Jones, Griffin's Head
1865 - Watkin William Wynn, Griffin Inn
1878 - Saul Andrews, Griffin Inn
1881 - Margaret Llewellyn, Danygraig Arms
1891 - Thomas Thomas
1895 - Edward Richards
1908-1920 - Samuel Bowditch
1924 – Ivor Jenkins
1934 - Mary Ann Morris Richardson
1941- 1947 Caradoc Griffiths
1951 - Ivor Lewis
1956 - Bertie and Bessie Davies
1956-1958 - Alberta and Cyril McElligott (‘Berta and Pat’)
1958-1960 - Eileen and Gwynfor Lovering
1960-69 - Lawrence (Laurie) Gibbs