NEW BROCHURE FOR 2013

Montessori Centre Wales Brochure2013 from The St Clears Times

St Clears Archives Unite Australian Couple With Lost Link

From the archives - Australian visit. Australian Couple Find Family

COFIO FRANK

Frank Oxenham Willey (Station Master’s Son) With Mrs. Betty Marks and Stella

My father went to St Clears as stationmaster at the end of 1926. We followed in March 1927. We lived in the station house. It had a kitchen a lounge and a pantry, no bathroom. I went to Glasfryn School. I then went to Whitland County School. Living in St Clears is probably the most impressive experience in my life. I had never seen a cow until then living in a terraced house in Port Talbot. By the time I was 10 or eleven I was talking to cows and horses. I loved the feeling of smoothing a cow’s nose. It feels like you are smoothing velvet. We were a long way from the centre of the village at the station. People used to ask, why is the station so far away from the village. The answer is, because it has to be close to the railway. I knew the bus driver Tudor Williams and he used to allow me to ride on the bus down to Pendine or Carmarthen. I have been in the cockle colony to collect money because our lorry driver was too afraid to go there because the women were so tough.

Most of my time was spent in the station. I had friends in the railway hotel and the holly bush. The station had two platforms with oil lamps on posts. As time went on they introduced Tilley lamps. The place was very well lit up with these lamps. One of the signalmen sensed that I wanted to learn about the station. He would always allow me in and let me carry on working the signal box. It isn’t like people imagine you just pull a lever. In the signal box there are bells, there was no gas, no electricity and no water. The bells were worked on wet batteries and a man used to come and fill them every week. Everything was done by code and you had to remember these codes. A certain number of rings controlled traffic to the left and to the right of the station. On one side was the Whitland box and on the other there was Sarnau box. The man in Whitland would ring one; I would tap one to show I was listening. The next ring would be one two three pause one. That was a passenger train stopping at all intermediate stations and could you take it. I had to ring back to accept it.

The station itself took an enormous amount of goods traffic. The horse and dray used to go back and forth from Salmons milk factory all day bringing churns of milk. Some churns even went into passenger trains. I used to wheel two of these seventeen-gallon churns along the platform at the same time. Rabbits, butter even calves used to be sent by passenger train. There were cattle pens on one side of the station and special wagons would be shunted in to take them to Whitland for the mart. My father lived for the railway; he didn’t have time for anything else. One of my jobs was to wheel the coal for the house from the yard. I had to cut old sleepers into kindling sticks.

The station buildings were an artist’s dream. They were small and the shape of them amazed me. It was the view from my window. My father had his own place and there was a booking office and a place for the porters. In the Station area nearly all of the children spoke English. The village was Welsh and what I didn’t like was the fact that the Welsh-speaking children did not speak to me. We used to catch a train to Whitland School every morning and waited with eight or nine boys. They all spoke Welsh and never said a word to me. It put me off the language all together.

Susan my carer told me about your project. Ever since I have known her I have spoken about St. Clears. She likes West Wales because she used to have a caravan down there. She told me that the signal box had been shown on T.V. I thought that the signal box was still there but discovered it had been taken away. I didn’t know that they had a council in St. Clears so I was amazed when I heard that there was a Town Council. I wrote to the clerk Mr. Bowen and now I have a file on St. Clears. I was a clerk and I have a file on all sorts of things including your project.

Comment: Frank heard about our project from his carer after she had seen it broadcast on BBC Wales Today. Frank was the Station Master of St Clears’ son. His childhood at the station has made a lasting impression on him. He eloquently described the station as an artist’s dream and the photographs support this. Frank moved to ‘the countryside’ from a terraced house in Port Talbot and discovered the joys of country life. Frank learned quickly and was soon operating the signal box under the supervision of the signalman. He is still able to remember the codes for signalling. He went on to become a railway clerk himself and travelled all over the U.K. He has kept all of his father’s memorabilia from the G.W.R. railway. Frank is a sprightly 92 years old with an amazing memory. After hearing about his enthusiasm for our project we didn’t hesitate in travelling to his home in Cardiff to interview him. We discovered a man who spends an enormous amount of time on his own save for visits from his carer Susan. He was lively, happy, interesting, extremely down to earth and a pleasure to talk to.

©2010,Alan Evans

New book by Roger Penn. Beyond the Call of Duty document his father's life as a GP in Whitland Carmarthenshire. Available via Gomer Press and Amazon. We also have a range of books we can send anywhere in the world. They include

St Clears the village where I went to school.
A delightful book documenting a schoolboy's memories of his walk to school and all the characters he meets along the way. Accompanied by the beautiful photographs of Stanley Phillips circa 1930. The images give a real feel for what life was like in rural Wales.

The photographs of Stanley Phillips
Almost half a century of work in a coffee book format. Stunning black and white images of Carmarthenshire and events unfolding from the early q900's onwards including Amy Johnson in Pendine. Malcolm Campbell's land speed record, Wing Commander Ira Jones and many more world events, which took place in a sleepy corner of Wales.

The Diary of a Merchant Seaman
This diary documents Stanley's life at sea as part of the North Atlantic convoys. He is a very articulate young man aboard ships crossing dangerous waters shortly before and during the First World War. He documents racing back with the Megantic, sister ship of the Titanic. A beautifully written book full of historic references.

A History of St Clears
Originally written as an essay for the Eisteddfod this book is a charming documentation of life in St Clears from the turn of the century. The writer was known as Taf. We have found plenty of photographs and illustrated the text so that you see exactly what Taf is referring to as you read.

Photographs and Films of West Wales
A DVD featuring the many photographs and films of Stanley Phillips, which are now housed at The National Library of Wales. Charming photographs and films bringing the community of West Wales to life.

If you would like to order any of the above please get in touch via the blog.

Some of the photograph's from today's course with Ashley. Ashley has an Olympus SLR with a standard lens and a zoom lens. We started by looking at moving form full auto to using the aperture priority and shutter priority because these allowed for a little more creativity. We also switched off the auto focus and started using the manual focus. Ashley did a few shots using selective manual focus and varying the depth of field focus.

We used a church yard because it ha plenty of greenery and interesting shadows. The first half of the day was very bright sunshine low in the sky. The aim was to reduce the shadows using fill flash. We also worked on composition and deciding wether to focus on the shadows or the highlights. We paid a visit to the local craft centre and did some interior shots using the skills developed earlier on.

By the end of the day Ashley was more confident using the manual settings and he was able to make decisions based on aperture or shutter speed in different lighting condition. We did cover a number of other areas but the day went very quickly. I am looking forward to seeing more of Ashley's work.

To see more visit Alan Evans Photography on Facebook

St Clears Times: CARMARTHENSHIRE PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVES

St Clears Times: CARMARTHENSHIRE PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVES