Wales on This Day

Sian Kilcoyne, Huw Rees

Description

Discover 366 fun and surprising stories about Wales – each linked to a specific day of the year. Did you know that the recipe of Tennessee’s famous Jack Daniel’s whiskey is rumoured to have originated in Llanelli, or that the world’s first radio play was set in a Welsh coal mine? Why was a showing of the Jurassic Park film in Carmarthen so special, and how is Rupert Bear connected to Snowdonia? Delve in to discover the stories that most history books leave out.

Sujets

• Histoire
• Great Britain
• History
• Wales
• Europe

Informations

• Publié par: Calon
• Date de parution: 20 octobre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781915279125
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

WALES ON THIS DAY
WALES ON THIS DAY
366 Facts You Probably Didn t Know


Huw Rees Sian Kilcoyne
Huw Rees and Sian Kilcoyne, 2022
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright owner. Applications for the copyright owner s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to Calon, University Registry, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff CF10 3NS.
www.uwp.co.uk
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-1-915279-11-8 eISBN: 978-1-915279-12-5
The right of Huw Rees and Sian Kilcoyne to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 79 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Cover artwork and illustrations by David Wardle
The publisher acknowledges the financial support of the Books Council of Wales
The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
To our parents, who inspired in us a love of the culture, history and language of Wales
1 JANUARY
The Welsh have a number of traditional New Year customs.
Calennig can trace its roots back to the Middle Ages and is still active in many areas of Wales today, especially the south-west. Children go from house to house, singing rhymes and wishing the occupants a healthy and prosperous new year. In exchange for this goodwill, they receive money, food or the calennig apple, which is an apple standing on a tripod of twigs and decorated with holly.
The tradition of first footing involved making sure that the first person invited into the house in the New Year was a dark-haired man bearing specific gifts: salt for seasoning, silver for wealth, coal for warmth, a match for kindling and bread for sustenance.
A visit from the Mari Lwyd was said to bring good luck for the coming year - find out more about this on 23 December.
2 JANUARY
On Sunday, 2 January 1155, Mwnt Bay near Cardigan was the site of an unsuccessful Flemish invasion of the Kingdom of Deheubarth.
Many Flemish people fought for William the Conqueror during the Norman invasion of England in 1066 and were subsequently rewarded with land holdings after William took control. By the early twelfth century, Flanders was becoming overpopulated and this, combined with devastating floods in 1106, saw many more Flemish people move to England. Initially, they were welcomed, but friction soon developed between the new arrivals and the English natives. The then king, Henry I s, solution was to drive out the native Welsh to allow the Flemings to colonise parts of Wales.
Henry I s death in 1135 prompted a succession crisis in England that resulted in a civil war that lasted until Henry II took the throne in 1153. Welsh rulers had taken advantage of this civil war to regain disputed lands. Henry II set about reversing this trend and the invasion at Mwnt was probably part of this process.
The Flemish soldiers that landed at Mwnt were roundly defeated by the native Welsh. The victory was celebrated in later centuries on the first Sunday in January by a festival known as Sul Coch y Mwnt , or Red Sunday, a reference to the bloodshed during the invasion. A nearby stream still goes by the name of Nant y Fflymon (Flemings Brook).
3 JANUARY
Joseph Jenkins Roberts was elected as the first president of the newly created Republic of Liberia on 3 January 1848.
Roberts (1809-76) was born in Virginia, United States. His father is thought to have been a slave-owning planter of Welsh origin and his mother, Amelia, was a slave. Amelia gave all but one of her children the middle name of Jenkins, which suggests that may have been their biological father s name.
Amelia was freed by the planter while she was young - before Joseph was born - and she then married James Roberts, a free Black man who established a successful business transporting goods by flatboat. Joseph Roberts would go on to work in the family business before emigrating to Liberia in 1829 with his wife, mother and five of his six siblings. He became the country s first African-American governor in 1841, paving the way for him to become Liberia s first president after it gained independence in 1847. He served until 1855, but was elected again in 1872.
Roberts legacy in Liberia remains: Liberia s main airport - Roberts International - and the town of Robertsport are named in his honour; his face is depicted on the Liberian ten-dollar bill introduced in 1997 and his birthday, 15 March, is a national holiday.
4 JANUARY
Griffith Park in Los Angeles - home to the Griffith Observatory - is named for Griffith J. Griffith, who was born in Betws, Bridgend on 4 January 1850.
Griffith emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1865, before moving to San Francisco in 1873, where he became manager of the Herald Publishing Company. In 1878, he became the mining correspondent for a San Francisco newspaper. He gained extensive knowledge of the mining industry on the Pacific Coast which led to him being employed by many mining syndicates where he earned a significant fortune.
In 1882, Griffith moved into property development and also started an ostrich farm near the Los Angeles River. The birds feathers were used in making women s hats. After the property rush peaked, in 1896, Griffith donated 3,015 acres of land to the City of Los Angeles, which later became Griffith Park. He also provided the money to build the park s Greek Theatre and Griffith Observatory. Griffith s legacy, however, is marred by his shooting of his wife in 1903. She survived but suffered injuries including the loss of her left eye. Griffith served two years in prison for the crime.
5 JANUARY
Traditionally in the Western Church, 5 January is the Twelfth Night.
Hunting the Wren is one of Wales s Twelfth Night customs. It usually took place between the 6 and 12 January and involved a party of young men catching a wren and putting it in a cage. They would then carry it through their community, singing songs that acclaimed it as the King of the Birds . The group would be invited into houses and given food and money.
In Pembrokeshire, this custom was called Twelfth tide and the wren s cage was in the form of a wooden cottage adorned with ribbons.
6 JANUARY
On 6 January 1926, Sir Clough Williams-Ellis first published photographs of scale models and preliminary designs in The Architects Journal for Portmeirion in north-west Wales.
Williams-Ellis stated that he wanted to pay tribute to the atmosphere of the Mediterranean and drew inspiration from the Italian village Portofino. He incorporated fragments of demolished buildings. The main building of the hotel and three cottages ( White Horses , Mermaid and The Salutation ) had previously been a private estate called Aber I (Ice Estuary) , which had been developed on the site of a late eighteenth-century foundry and boatyard in the 1850s. Williams-Ellis changed the name to Portmeirion: port from its position on the coast and meirion from the county of Meirionydd in which it was sited. Hotel Portmeirion was officially opened for the Easter Weekend of 1926.
It s now a popular tourist village, owned by a charitable trust. The majority of hotel buildings are used as hotel rooms or self-catering cottages, together with shops, a caf , a tea room and restaurant.

DID YOU KNOW?
Portmeirion has served as the location for numerous films and television shows, most famously the 1960s cult television series The Prisoner. It s also thought that No l Coward wrote the play Blithe Spirit while visiting.

7 JANUARY
Born in Merthyr on 7 January 1956 as John Richard Owens, Johnny Owen was bantamweight boxing champion of Great Britain and the Commonwealth and Europe.
Owen began to box aged eight and went on to win several Welsh, British and Commonwealth titles. He was a quiet, reserved and friendly character outside the ring, but inside it he was a formidable opponent with a determination and strength in contrast to his frail-looking body, which earned him nicknames such as the Bionic Bantam and the Merthyr Matchstick . He possessed an impressive stamina, built by long hours running up the steep hills of the south Wales Valleys.
On 19 September 1980, Owen was knocked out by Mexican boxer Lupe Pintor during a challenge for the World Bantamweight title at the Grand Olympic Auditorium, Los Angeles. Owen fell into a coma and never regained consciousness. He died on 4 November that year. Owen s family, far from blaming the World Champion, telegraphed him shortly after the loss and encouraged him to go on fighting. Twenty years later, a memorial to Johnny Owen was unveiled in Merthyr Tydfil and, at the request of the late fighter s father, the unveiling was performed by Lupe Pintor.
8 JANUARY
Born on 8 January 1823, Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) from Llanbadoc, near Usk, was one of the greatest experts in natural history and explorers of the nineteenth century. He was a leading thinker on evolution and his unconventional ideas caused much discomfort to the scientific community.
Wallace was also a biologist and a social activist, but he is best known for independently coming up with the theory of evolution by natural selection and then co-publishing a paper on the subject with Charles Darwin in 1858. Despite this, his fame faded quickly after his death, but he has become a more well-known and respected figure in recent years.
9 JANUARY
Sarah Jane Rees, who was born in Llangrannog on 9 January 1839, was a navigational and nautical trainer, a campaigner for the temperance movement, a s