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14 unusual facts about Rhondda


1880 in Wales

10 December — 101 miners are killed in an accident at the Penygraig Colliery, Rhondda.

Chris Bryant

Christopher John Bryant (born 11 January 1962) is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Rhondda since 2001 and the Shadow Minister for Welfare Reform since 2013.

Christine James

Christine James was born in Tonypandy, Rhondda, and educated at Porth County Grammar School, then later at Aberystwyth University, where she gained a first-class honours degree in Welsh and was subsequently awarded a PhD for a thesis on the Laws of Hywel Dda.

Clifford Cory

In 1895 he heard the 'Ton Pentre Temperance' brass band from the Rhondda Valley at the opening of the Colliery Library in Gelli and offered to provide financial assistance for them resulting in the band’s change of name to ‘The Cory Band’.

Environment Agency v Clark

Rhondda Waste Disposal Ltd, a company wholly owned by Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council ran a landfill site under a waste management licence in Nant-y-Gwyddon, Rhondda Valley.

Ernest Zobole

Although Zobole lived and worked in a number of places in Wales, he spent most of his life in Ystrad Rhondda, where he died in 1999.

Zobole's paintings, originally oil on canvas, later switching to oil on board, reflected the industrial setting of the Rhondda Valleys.

J. Gwyn Griffiths

Born in 1911 in Porth in the Rhondda Valley, Griffiths was educated at Porth Grammar school before reading Latin at University College, Cardiff of the University of Wales, gaining a first class degree in 1932.

Leanne Wood

Born in the Rhondda, Wales, she has represented the South Wales Central region as a Member of the National Assembly for Wales since 2003.

Marco Marenghi

Marco Marenghi is a Welsh film animator/director who was born in Rhondda in Wales.

Rachel Trezise

Rachel Trezise (born 1978) is a Welsh author, born in Cwmparc, Rhondda.

Tonypandy

Located to the north-west of the town, the remains of an Iron Age settlement Hen Dre'r Gelli lies on the slopes of Mynydd Y Gelli hill between Tonypandy and Gelli.

Treorchy Primary School

Treorchy Primary School is a community school situated in Treorchy in the Rhondda Valley area of Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales.

Welsh League

In similar circumstances the Northern Union chose another venue where professional sympathies lay, this time Tonypandy in the Rhondda Valley.


1890 in Wales

22 November - (in Lancashire) Harry Pollitt, Communist trade union leader and parliamentary candidate for Rhondda East (died 1960)

Frank Wrentmore

Frank Wrentmore (birth registered during October→December 1884 in Pontypridd) was a Welsh rugby union and professional rugby league footballer of the 1900s, playing club level rugby union (RU) for Penygraig RFC, and playing club level rugby league (RL) for Mid-Rhondda, he served with the Somerset Light Infantry with the British Expeditionary Force in World War I.

Glamorgan County Council election, 1889

In the Rhondda district the success of William Abraham at the 1885 General Election had led to the emergence of a Rhondda Liberal and Labour Association within which working class leaders were active.

Gwilym Davies

Gwilym Elfed Davies, Baron Davies of Penrhys (1913–1992), Welsh Labour politician, Member of Parliament for Rhondda East 1959–1974

Käte Bosse-Griffiths

Griffiths, a Welsh and Classics scholar brought up in the Rhondda, was at that time a research student at Oxford, but the two of them returned to the Rhondda and made their home in the village of Pentre.

Laurence Eaves

Laurence Eaves was born in Pentre, Rhondda, UK in 1948 and was educated at Rhondda County Grammar School, Porth, and at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he took Firsts in Physics and Mathematics Moderations and in Physics Final Honours.

Leighton Andrews

In 2002 Leighton Andrews was selected to fight Rhondda for Labour, after the party's shock defeat to Plaid Cymru's Geraint Davies at the 1999 Assembly election.

Llantwit

Llantwit Fardre - village between Pontypridd and Bridgend, Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales

Miners' institute

By the eve of the Second World War there were more than a hundred miners' institutes, those of note include 'Y Stiwt' in Rhosllannerchrugog, the Oakdale Miners' Institute, the Parc and Dare in the Rhondda and the Abercynon Miners' Institute.

Mynydd y Gelli

Another more grandiose name for the site is the Rhondda Stonehenge.

National Welsh Omnibus Services

Rhondda Buses was created from a consortium of Stevensons of Uttoxeter, Julian Peddle, British Bus PLC, Potteries Motor Traction and later Western Travel, owners of Red & White.

Penrhys

The march was organised by the South Wales Miners' Federation and the Rhondda District, but lost support due to opposition from the TUC.

Penygraig

Penygraig, like many of the villages of the Rhondda, also produced notable boxers, including Tom Thomas, who in 1908 became the first British national middle-weight champion, and in 1909 was the first winner of the Lonsdale Belt at the same weight.

Plebs' League

Central to the formation of the League was Noah Ablett, a miner from the Rhondda who was at the core of a group at Ruskin College, Oxford who opposed the lecturers' opposition to Marxism.

Ponty

Pontypridd RFC, a Welsh Premiership rugby team from Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales

Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway

The Rhondda and Swansea Bay Railway connected the coal mines of the Rhondda Valley to the Swansea Bay ports.

Rhondda Jones

Rhondda Jones was the first Professor of Zoology at James Cook University, and served as Deputy Vice-Chancellor.

Tom Norris

Born in Clydach Vale in the Rhondda, Norris became the Welsh heavyweight champion in December 1925, losing the title in the rematch to Dick Power some three months later.

Treherbert

In August 1845, the trustees of the Marquess of Bute bought the Cwmsaerbren farm from William Davies for a fee of £11,000 to sink the first steam coal pit in the Rhondda valley.

Treorchy Primary School

This school is one of the feeder schools of the Upper Rhondda and 95% of its children are enrolled into Treorchy Comprehensive School once they finish Key Stage 2.

Young Allsopp

Based in his home village of Trealaw in the Rhondda Valley, Allsopp was notable for becoming the Welsh bantamweight champion in 1921.

Alsop was born in the village of Trealaw in the industrial coal mining region of the Rhondda Valley to English parents who had moved to the area from Bristol.