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.
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.
The daughter of a Customs and Excise officer, Davies was born in Tonypandy, Glamorgan, in 1948, and was educated at Our Lady's School, Cardiff.
Trealaw is a dormitory town of the more famous Tonypandy, its name translates from the Welsh language as 'the Town of Alaw', which derives from Alaw Goch or Alaw Coch (red melody), the bardic name of David (Dafydd) Williams (d. 1863) the father of Judge Gwilym Williams (1839–1906), who founded the village (along with that of Williamstown, a village to the south of Trealaw) during the 'coal-rush' of the 19th century.
In similar circumstances the Northern Union chose another venue where professional sympathies lay, this time Tonypandy in the Rhondda Valley.