: General

St Fagans: National History Museum in the past 60 years has played an important role in collecting and recording the experiences of women in Wales. The Archive collections at St Fagans reflects the work done by several members of research staff to document the many facets that contributed to the lives of past generations of women in Wales, and continues to document their experiences. This blog focuses particularly on the work of one woman researcher, namely S. Minwel Tibbott, and her legacy, and on International Women’s Day looks at her invaluable contribution to document the lives of her fellow sisters in Wales.

S. Minwel Tibbott began working in St Fagans in the early 1960’s and later became Assistant Keeper. Her research work mainly focused on women’s everyday domestic lives collected via oral testimony, photography and film, and was set against a post Second World War Wales that was rapidly transforming, but for a number of women, life had stayed relatively unchanged for generations. Domestic appliances and labour saving devices were emerging and available, but out of the economic reach of many Welsh women at this time, however, as the 1960’s progressed and disposable income more commonplace this began to change.  Many of the images shown here therefore capture domestic rituals that may have been lost had it not been for the foresight of S. Minwel Tibbott to record them. St Fagans continues to record and document the lives of women in Wales via the #Creu Hanes #Making History project. Recent donations have included an archive collection relating to one Welsh woman’s experience at Greenham Common for example.

Miss Jones, Llanuwchllyn, Merionethshire making bread.

Here at St Fagans, many of our curators have been travelling the length and breadth of Wales co- producing audio-visual content for the new galleries.

Last week, my colleague Dafydd Wiliam and I began work on a new and exciting task, this time a little closer to home, a stone throw away in Tremorfa.

Over the next few months, our focus will be the Vulcan pub. We’ll be conducting oral histories with former customers and landlords of the former Adamsdown pub, recording and filming their experiences and memories. The completed interviews will be edited into a short film which will be displayed in one of the redeveloped galleries. But also we hope these memories will give us as curators, a clearer picture of life at the Vulcan, its culture and its community.

Our first interviewees were Rhona and Mel Rees, landlords of the Vulcan pub between 1983 and 1985. From the very beginning, it was clear that they were extremely fond of the pub and its customers, and that they thoroughly enjoyed their time there. They described the pub as their living room, and the words cosy, friendly, and fun, were said regularly. They had plenty of amusing and comic tales from the pub to tell, but they also touched on deeper themes, such as raising a family in a pub and also the economic side of things and the decline of the trade. All in all it was an eye-opening interview, and we learnt so much about their daily lives as landlords of the Vulcan in the 80’s.

My personal highlight of the interview was a story about a prank played on Mel’s 50^th birthday involving a kissogram visiting the Vulcan, but I won’t give too much away now!

Mel and Rhona truly captured the atmosphere and character of the pub and its people, and I can’t wait to go out again to meet and interview the people who knew this very special pub.

If you or somebody you know have stories or objects related to the Vulcan, we’d love to hear from you – please leave a message in the comments box below.

#MakingHistory #CreuHanes

Hi Bulb Buddies,

I would like to congratulate schools that have entered flower records to the National Museum Wales website:

Daffodil: 

Crocus: 

Watch your plants closely Bulb Buddies, you could see flowers any day now! Please remember to share your flower records on the Museum website. My last blog and the resource on the website entitled ‘keeping flower records’ give you advice on how to do this. Once all the plants have flowered and everyone has entered their flowering records, we will be able to work out the average flowering date for the Crocus and the Daffodil. We will then be able to compare our findings to those of previous years.

We had predicted that plants would flower earlier this year due to a mild December, but a colder January – March and lower sunlight hours could have impacted on our bulbs. In my next blog, I will look at averages and compare the weather so far this year to the same period in previous years.

There have been some lovely comments over the last few weeks, which have shown a lot of care and concern for your plants. I would like to say a big thank you to all of you for looking after your plants so well.

Keep up the good work Bulb Buddies.

Professor Plant

John Roberts, 'Telynor Cymru, from Newtown, 1816-1894  

The Photographic Archive at St. Fagans: National History Museum has over 200,000 images in its collection and reflects Welsh Social and Cultural History. It documents people’s everyday life over the last few hundred years. The images capture the Welsh as they work, rest and play. The collection includes photographs from rural and industrial Wales of subjects such as: costume and dress; textiles; work and trades; domestic life; cultural life including music and sport; traditional craft; vernacular architecture; furniture and interiors. To celebrate St. David’s Day here are a few examples of the more steryotypical images from the collection! Dydd Gwyl Dewi Hapus I Bawb!

First Welsh Schoolboys team, 15 players and 12 officials, 1904.

28 Chwefror 1946 – Dwa yma y bore i nol benthyg bwyell a phlaen i drwsio braich y gadair freichiau. Tywydd gaeafol a hynod o oer. San yn dod adref efo Septic Ulcer ar ei choes.

Ar ddiwrnod olaf y mis bach, cofnododd Kate Rowlands bod ei mab, Dwa (Edward), wedi dod i fenthyg offer gwaith coed i drwsio braich y gadair freichiau.

Byddai troi llaw at drwsio, pwytho neu ailgylchu pethau wedi bod yn ailnatur i’r rheini a fu’n byw yn ystod y rhyfeloedd. Gan fod adnoddau mor brin doedd prynu o’r newydd ddim yn opsiwn i’r rhan fwyaf. Ychydig o ddodrefn newydd a gynhyrchwyd yn ystod yr Ail Ryfel Byd a dim ond rhai pobl fyddai’n gymwys i’w prynu gyda thalebau pwrpasol.

Ym 1941, dechreuodd Bwrdd Masnach y Llywodraeth fynd ati i ddylunio casgliad o ddodrefn utility fel rhan o’r cynllun dogni dodrefn. Y bwriad oedd creu darnau o safon, o ddyluniad syml a oedd yn rhad i’w cynhyrchu.

Cyhoeddwyd y catalog cyntaf o ddodrefn utility ym 1943 gyda chasgliad o tua thrideg darn. Dyluniwyd y dodrefn gan aelodau o'r pwyllgor ymgynghorol o dan arweiniad y dylunydd dodrefn, Gordon Russell. Roedd y dodrefn yn syml ac yn fodern, gydag ôl dylanwad y mudiad celfyddyd a chrefft (arts and crafts). Ni chynhyrchwyd dodrefn nad oedd yn cydymffurfio â safonau utility a rhoddwyd y bathodyn utility, ‘CC41’, ar bob darn fel arwydd o safon.

Gellid archebu’r dodrefn o’r catalog neu eu prynu o siopau lleol a thalwyd amdanynt gyda thalebau. Ond nid pawb oedd yn gymwys - rhaid oedd llenwi ffurflen i sicrhau trwydded cyn derbyn y talebau gwerth trideg uned. Rhoddwyd blaenoriaeth i’r rheini a oedd wedi colli eu cartrefi adeg y rhyfel o ganlyniad i'r bomiau ac i gyplau priod ifanc yn symud i gartrefi newydd, fel y prefabs.

Yn ychwanegol at ddodrefn utility byddai cyplau ifanc wedi etifeddu hen ddodrefn gan eu teuluoedd. Pwy a ŵyr, efallai mai hen gadair freichiau gan ei fam yr oedd Dwa’n mynd ati i’w thrwsio ym 1946.