August 2026 Newsletter | Abertillery And Dist

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What’s On at The Met

Fri 7th Aug 10 am-noon Free Music Friday RAGSY

Mon 19th Aug 11 am and 2 pm £4 SILENT DISCO

Sat 22nd Aug 11 am £12 Castle of Illusions presents WELCOME TO WONDERLAND

For more information on these and more visit:

https://awenboxoffice.com/the-met/whats-on

or tel 01495 533195

Museum Opening Times

The Museum is open to the public, free of charge:

Thursday to Saturday 10 am – 1 pm

Contact us

Museum phone number 01495 211140

Email: abertillerymuseum@btconnect.com

Web: www.abertilleryanddistrictmuseum.org.uk

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/abertillerymuseum

Contact Names

Mr G Murphy Curator

Mrs P. Bearcroft Deputy Curator

Mrs E. Ewers Chair

Mrs K. Pratley Treasurer

Mrs Jen Price Secretary

Mrs S. Murphy Newsletter

Vice Presidents (Annual Subscription £25)

Rev Roy Watson

Mrs Carol Brooks

Mrs Margaret Cook

Mrs Margaret Herbert

Ms Michele Dack

Dr Graham Eyre-Morgan

July 100 Club

This month’s prize numbers were drawn by visitor Delia Holmes and the lucky winners are:-

No. 52 Linda Chaplin £20

No. 44 Sian Phillips £10

If you would like to join our 100 club and be in with a chance of winning, it costs just £1 a month. Ask at the museum for further details.

Partial Solar Eclipse

On Wednesday 12th August, a partial solar eclipse will be visible from the UK and the further west and south you are the better the experience. A solar eclipse occurs when our moon moves between the Sun and the Earth and blocks our view of the sun and this eclipse will be 90-96% coverage meaning it will not go entirely dark but it will go pretty dark and feel cold.

This eclipse will be a bit different to the last few as well in as much that it will happen after 6 pm when the sun is much lower in the sky and appears larger. For us here in South East Wales, it will start at 6.17 pm with the maximum coverage occurring at 7.12 pm. It will be all over by 8.06 pm.

It is dangerous to look directly at the sun unless you are using special eclipse glasses (which should only be purchased through reputable suppliers). Alternatively a telescope can be used as long as it has a solar filter fitted. If you don’t have access to either, the Royal Observatory will be live-streaming it on their website:

https://www.rmg.co.uk/royal-observatory

Voices of Abertillery

It was a Sunday morning. I can remember siting around the wireless listening to Mr Chamberlain. It was a beautiful day. I was a bit frightened and wondered what was going to happen.

The week before war broke out my mother and my sister and I had gone to Weston for a little holiday. My father had sent for us. He said, ‘You’d better come home because things are looking dark’, and we had to go and measure for gas masks.

So we came home. I can remember being quite concerned about it all. I was 15 and I thought to myself, ‘Will we all die? Will the Germans come? That perhaps it was the end of life as we knew it’. We didn’t know what to expect.

The above is an extract from ‘Voices of Abertillery’ compiled by Simon Eckley & Don Bearcroft. It’s a compilation of memories from interviews of local people and is available to buy now from the museum for just £1 a copy. Pick up yours while stocks last.

The Filming of the Antiques Roadshow

Have you ever wondered what goes into the making of a TV program? I have and, thanks to tickets from a friend of my niece, I had the chance to find out when the BBC’s ‘Antiques Roadshow’ came to Caerphilly last month…

Saturday 18th July was another hot sunny day and the BBC were at Caerphilly Castle and were expecting around 2000 members of the public. If you’re familiar with the TV show you will be aware that filming is usually outdoors and the ‘experts’ and film crews are spaced out around the grounds usually under large umbrellas.

Many people came armed with things for evaluation while others, myself included, simply went along as spectators. While entry to Caerphilly Castle is normally subject to a charge, for this event entry was free though everyone attending still needed a ticket (available free of charge through the BBC website).

Those fortunate enough to get tickets were given an entry time; my party’s ticket was for 10 am entry and once we were through the bag search and given our wrist bands we headed in to find that filming had already started. (We later found out that filming can go on until 8 pm).

The first thing we saw was a rather long queue for anyone who had brought items along for evaluation on impulse (rather than going through the website). Those with things that were of interest would then be directed to the relevant ‘expert’ for possible filming.

Among the experts we saw that day were Mark Smith (pictured here) and Robert Tilney, (both experts in the field of Arms & Militaria), Lisa Lloyd, Ronnie Archer Morgan, Rupert Maas and the one and only Eric Knowles who is also a regular host of ‘Bargain Hunt’. Then of course there was the was the presenter, Fiona Bruce, looking her usual elegant self in a mid-calf brown skirt and pretty green floral blouse.

While waiting for filming to commence at one location, we overheard a member of the film crew comment on what a beautiful place it was, indeed he said the castle with its surrounding views was one of the best locations he had ever filmed at.

I think it fair to say that us, as spectators, are there as ‘extras’ and are asked to stand around the item being filmed and look interested even though many of us can’t hear a word being said! This is because the event is being filmed not for the benefit of those watching, but for the benefit of the viewing public who will see the show on TV.

Spectators are also asked not to leave the ‘set’ until told they have finished. This is necessary to ensure continuity of the people in the background so that if they use cuts from more than one ‘take’ and splice them together, then the same people can be seen in the background throughout.

One gentleman with an interesting piece of ceramic was filmed four times and each time he had to pretend to be surprised by the value placed on it which is not easy after the first time! I’ve often wondered why sometimes those given high valuations don’t seem that impressed – but I now realise that it could be the second, third or fourth time they’ve heard it!

Expert, Mark Smith, described some war medals brought in by one lady and was asked to make it briefer, which he did. He was then asked to make it even more brief and, much to the delight of the crowd, he said simply ‘They’re medals’.

Meanwhile, just behind us, Fiona was being given some history on Caerphilly Castle.

At least that is what I think was going on as, once again, I wasn’t able to hear a word being said. Those of you familiar with the show will know that Fiona also does her ‘basic, better, best’ piece where she is shown three items, given a bit about them by an expert, and then asked to place them in order of value.

Only one of these usually feature in each show however we saw three being filmed, one of which was jewellery so valuable they had THREE security guards to protect it!

I will be keen to see which one makes the final cut. Mark Smith told us the show will be aired around Christmas time so watch out for us standing around in the baking heat wearing summer clothes!

by Sally Murphy

THE RE-LAUNCH OF SS GREAT BRITAIN

Not literally of course but the visitor experience to this iconic ship is undergoing a major upgrade.

By mattbuck (category) - Photo by mattbuck., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=7335238

The SS Great Britain has been moored at Bristol Docks for the last 56 years and I am sure many of our readers will have visited it. In readiness for the 60th anniversary of its return in 2030, the ship having been built in Bristol in the early 1840s, there is a major project underway including a brand new replacement museum which has only just opened.

The new museum lies alongside the ship and it focusses on the human story of this great vessel by telling the story of its life through the lives of the passengers and workers. Even the name of the site has changed; it is now called 'Bristol Dockyards – The Home of the SS Great Britain'. What will it offer? Well, the trust that looks after the ship said they wanted to offer more than just a ship and so there will be two museums, two historic dockyards, an internationally important maritime archive and an educational and cultural programme.

Don't let’s forget the ship itself. Designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, it was the fastest ship of its day and carried thousands of migrants from Britain to a new life in Australia. But do you also know it was involved in conflict in India and the Crimea? Some of the work to revamp the site is ongoing, including the restoration of Albion Dockyard; this will continue as a fully functioning working dockyard as well as offering new heritage visitor experiences.

It seems that right from the start, when the project was envisaged, the Trust wanted to tell at least some of the personal stories of the many thousands of passengers and workers who travelled on the SS Great Britain, enduring journeys of which some lasted months at a time.

This was primarily in the 1840s and 1850s and while the ship was revolutionary in its design and technology, it would still have offered vastly different travelling experiences for those travelling in the cheapest basic accommodation compared with those able to afford first class.

And what about the workers – what were their lives like aboard ship?

All very different from cruising today!

To find out, why not take a trip over to Bristol to see for yourself. It is open Tuesdays to Sundays (usually shut Mondays but not always on public holidays). A standard adult ticket will set you back £25 but that allows you to visit all year with as many return trips as you like in that period.

And if you want a bit of extra excitement, you can get a ticket to go up into the rigging. What are you waiting for?

Jen Price

QUICK QUIZ (answers on next page)

Name the month:-

Which month has the same number of letters as the number it comes in the year?
Which month is the famous Munich Beer festival held?
Which month is the London Marathon held?
Which month has the ‘Glorious 12th’, the start of the grouse shooting season?
In 44BC Julius Caesar was assassinated in which month?

To read past editions of this newsletter use this link:

www.abertilleryanddistrictmuseum.org.uk/newsletter

Blackpool Pleasure Beach

Regular readers will know that I’ve featured quite a few UK theme parks in this newsletter over the past year and this time it is the turn of Blackpool’s Pleasure Beach Resort. It started life as a seaside amusement park but now has some theming and a one-price-ride-all ticket entry scheme which qualifies it as a theme park in all but name. It has some great coasters, including some Grade II listed ones so it is definitely worthy of a mention….

The park was founded by American, Alderman William George Bean in 1896. A wooden Switchback rollercoaster had been built at Blackpool in 1891 and Bean built the park around this pre-existing coaster. By 1903 Bean had teamed up with a local man John Outhwaite and together they bought 30 acres of land to expand the amusement park. They took their inspiration both from a fairground in London’s Earl Court and from a recent visit to New York’s ‘Coney Island’. Bean wanted to ‘make adults feel like children again and inspire gaiety of a primarily innocent character’. (Which is just what Walt Disney envisaged when he opened Disneyland California in 1955).

In 1904 a ride called ‘Sir Hiram Maxim’s Flying Machine’ (a rotary swing and designed by the British inventor of the same name) opened followed by ‘The River Caves of the World’ in 1905. Remarkably, both these rides are still in operation today. Just two years later a second wooden coaster opened called simply ‘Scenic Railway’. It was around this time that the park became known as ‘Blackpool Pleasure Beach’ though today its official title is ‘Pleasure Beach Resort’. In 1911, Outhwaite died. William Bean continued to run the park though the Outhwaite family retained shares in the park until 1931 when they sold to Leonard Thompson, son-in-law of William Bean. The Thompson family still own the park to this day.

The park continued to expand and grow. The Big Dipper opened on 23rd August 1923, the Nickelodeon Streak in 1932 (originally called just ‘Roller Coaster’) and the Grand National in 1935. All are wooden coasters and all are still in operation today. Both the Big Dipper and Grand National were granted Grade II listed status in April 2017. The Big Dipper, pictured here, was designed and built by William Strickler and John Miller. It is over 3000 feet long and reaches speeds of around 50mph. The ride lasts three minutes though the first minute is taken in the climb to the top of the first drop which is 65 feet high.

Like other theme parks, Blackpool can boast a few ‘firsts’. Their ‘Big One’ steel rollercoaster held the record for the tallest and steepest in the world when it opened in 1994, a record it held for two years.

Avalanche, a steel coaster, is the UK’s first and only bobsled coaster (it actually looks like a bobsled run). It also boasts the ‘Steeplechase’ coaster (opened 1977); a three track steel coaster where riders sit on metal horses and race each other around the track. It is the only one of its kind left in existence while Valhalla is a dark indoor log flume ride which has won the World’s best water ride award no less than seven times - but be warned you will get very wet! It’s newest coaster is ‘Icon’. Opened in 2018, Icon is a steel multi-launch coaster with another first for the park, a back seat that spins though there is an extra charge to ride in this seat for those brave enough!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackpool_Pleasure_Beach

Sally Murphy

Quick Quiz answers