The Leader is reporting this morning (Sunday) that the body of a man has been recovered following a 'concern for safety' incident yesterday (August 13).
The story say that North Wales Police confirmed they, alongside other emergency services were dealing with a safety incident in Pontcysyllte during the afternoon.
* For the full story, see: https://www.leaderlive.co.uk/news/20642369.wrexham-body-found-incident-river-pontcysyllte/
Denbighshire County Council is informing residents of its plans to accommodate visits to Llangollen’s Horseshoe Falls.
With a busy weekend expected, the council
is working to manage the increase in visitors and has made a number of
preparations.
Extra countryside rangers are being
deployed at Horseshoe Falls, to provide information, support for visitors and
help deal with any issues.
The council says it is aware also aware of
parking issues at the tourist spot and will be deploying civil enforcement
officers to manage the site.
Residents and visitors are reminded
parking restrictions are important for both road safety and ensuring there is a
fair turnover of parking spaces.
Motorists not complying with parking
restrictions risk receiving a Penalty Charge Notice.
The council is asking visitors to park
responsibly in designated areas and to respect the countryside, this includes
keeping dogs on a lead and to bring picnics rather than disposable barbeques.
Those wishing to visit Horseshoe Falls on
Saturday can also use the Dee Valley Picturesque Bus Service which is available
to pick up from Llangollen Parade Street from 8.35am. The service will stop at
the falls and more information can be found here - https://www.clwydianrangeanddeevalleyaonb.org.uk/projects/the-picturesque-bus/
Visitors are being reminded to be respectful to those working to ensure the safety and enjoyment of visitors and residents.
Llangollen firefighters have revealed how they put out a forest blaze within feet of heatherland at Nantyr yesterday afternoon.
On their Facebook page, the fire station says: "16:20 32M1 called out to a fire in the open in Nantyr.
"It travelled up a hard standing track up into the forest. The high pressure lance was used to extinguish the deep seated fire.
Police say they are hopeful of catching those responsible for the graffiti which has appeared in parts of Llangollen.
In a message on the North Wales Police Community Alerts system earlier this week, officer Geraint Jones said the Dee Valley Neighbourhood Policing (NPT) was appealing for information following an increase in graffiti around Llangollen town and by Riverside Park.
He added that a distinct signature that was appearing on the grafitti was the word 'bizz'.
In a new message on the NPT, PCSO 3684 Peter Jones says: "We are currently aware of some graffiti that has appeared in Llangollen.
"We want to reassure you that an investigation into the matter is well underway, we are hopeful that the offenders will be identified and dealt with.
"If you have any information about the incidents please contact 101 or speak to your local Police Community Support Officer."
This Saturday evening Black Park Chapel – just down the road from Llangollen – is hosting something different for those who enjoy live music.
It’s a performance by acclaimed professional jazz musicians Faith Brackenbury and Toni Bianco.
Their touring project, entitled Visio Improvisus, is an
exploration of the music of St. Hildegard von Bingen, fusing it with their
contemporary jazz and improvisation backgrounds.
Layers of violin/viola lines and drones create a
base to ethereal Latin vocal monophonic scores, accompanied by rolling drums
and percussion.
This tour is promoting their double album of the
music, Wayward Mystic, and is aiming to encourage communities to re-engage with
live music performance after these years of social isolation and
loneliness.
Bridget Drukker of Black Park said: “I went to the Anoushka Shankar concert at the Llangollen Eisteddfod - incredible, full house and standing ovation. One of the best concerts that I have ever been to.
“Faith Brackenbury is influenced by Anoushka's father, the famous Ravi Shankar, and I think some of those who went to the Eisteddfod would enjoy this on Saturday.”
* Tickets are available on the door or from: www.ticketsource.co.uk/visio-improvisus/visio-improvisus-improvisations-on-the-music-of-st-hildegard-von-bingen/e-pyvgod
* Harlech Foodservice Managing Director David Cattrall. Picture by Rick Matthews.
Community groups and local clubs across North Wales are being urged to bid for a slice of a new £5,000 charity fund.
Leading food wholesaler Harlech Foodservice, which
has bases in Criccieth in Gwynedd and Chester, has launched a community
foundation as part of the company’s 50th anniversary celebrations.
The family firm was founded in 1972 as a holiday
season supplier to pubs, hotels and campsites in North West Wales and has grown
into a £30 million turnover business serving Wales, the North West and West Midlands.
Now Managing Director David Cattrall is inviting
community groups, projects, associations and locally based charities to pitch
for some cash.
He said: “We have grown from small beginnings into
a major North Wales company with bases in Criccieth and Chester and we couldn’t
have done that without the support of our loyal customers across the region.
“They have helped us grow into a business employing
over 200 staff which supplies not just the tourism and hospitality industry but
also schools, colleges, hospitals and care homes so we want to celebrate the
success we’ve had by putting something back into the communities which have
supported us
“We are asking local groups across North Wales who
benefit the community in some way to come forward and pitch for funding which
could provide them with some vital cash for something really important to them.
“It could be a mini bus fund for a local dance
troupe or maybe some gardening equipment for a primary school, a new pool table
for a youth club or art and craft equipment for a pensioners’ group which
prevents older people feeling isolated and lonely.
“We are open to suggestions and the main criteria
is that people need to show us how they are fundraising and how much they are
aiming to raise.
“We are looking to give a helping hand to projects
right across the region so we want to hear from the people involved and we’ll
be looking to hand over up to £1,000 to the chosen deserving causes.”
Harlech Foodservices has a track record of helping
out in the communities it serves and stepped up in the pandemic to make
donations to food banks across Wales and into Cheshire and Shropshire.
When their delivery lorries were unable to carry
stock to their usual customers they were diverted to charities from Conwy to
Newport in Gwent and from their own doorstep in Pwllheli to Northwich and
Telford across the English border.
Now as business reaches a peak in the busy holiday
season they are looking to hear from deserving causes who can bid for a share
of the £5,000 charity by sending a brief description of their organisation,
what they are raising money for and what they are looking to achieve along with
daytime contact details including a phone number. Bid descriptions should be
sent to sales@harlech.lls.com
The business founded by Colin and Gill Foskett
above a shop in Harlech in 1972 now delivers up to 5,000 product lines to
cafés, restaurants, pubs and public sector customers across North and
Mid-Wales, Shropshire, the Midlands and the North West from its modern bases in
Criccieth and Chester.
Colin and Gill’s sons and daughter are still on the
board and the third generation of the Foskett family are now among a workforce
which has grown steadily as the business has expanded to include NHS Wales,
care homes and schools, colleges and universities.
For more on Harlech Foodservices go to https://www.harlech.co.uk/
.png)
It’s now more than 30 years since the last history of Llangollen was published.
Now there is a fascinating new version written by Peter Jones, a trustee of the town’s museum.
Its 48 pages are packed with basic historical information about almost every important aspect of local life, liberally interspersed with some marvellous nuggets that are probably less well known.
For instance, while detailing the rich past of Valle Crucis Abbey the author notes that back in 1535 many monasteries had become so corrupt that their inhabitants had been forced to turn to crime, including Robert Salisbury, Abbot of Valle Crucis, who was arrested for having been part of a highway robbery.
.png)
Another iconic landmark highlighted in the booklet, Castell Dinas Bran, has its own interesting little tale which centres on one of its medieval occupants, Myfanwy, daughter of tenant Iorwerth Ddu ap Ednyfed Gam.
Her unrequited love for a man named Hywel ap Einion is celebrated in a famous poem penned by John Ceiriog Hughes. Published in 1858 and entitled Myfanwy Fychan, the work was later set to music and became a staple of Welsh male voice choirs.
The booklet, produced thanks to the extensive use of the resources of Llangollen Museum with suggestions from David Crane, has compact and easily digestible sections on the town’s pre-historic beginnings, the bridge – one of the Seven Wonders of Wales – the canal, the Chain Bridge and the steam railway which Dr Beeching failed to kill off in the 1960s.
We also learn about the gradual development of the town centre, illustrated by some absorbing maps, and the area’s transition from a rural to an industrial economy facilitated by the building of the canal, the railway and Telford’s new road now the A5.
On the local industrial front, how many knew that the Llangollen Hide & Skin Company once based in Church Street from 1885 had during the Second World War produced leather jerkins for the army and, earlier, bindings for the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
It’s also interesting to note that the opening by a Manchester company of the Lower Dee Mill as a spinning and weaving factory in 1805 met with some local resistance.
However, its opponents did grudgingly concede that it was, at least, “a source of employment to local children who otherwise would have been a burden to the parish”.
.png)
* The Ladies of Llangollen.
That opposition to the new mill, we are told, was actually led by the legendary Ladies of Llangollen who get their own dedicated section of the booklet, which reveals that, although they were by far the most famous inhabitants of Plas Newydd they were not actually the only two ladies to occupy the town’s mini stately home.
When the property was sold in 1832 following the deaths of both Sarah Ponsonby and Eleanor Butler, the buyers were two ladies who had long lived in Llangollen.
Amelia Lolly, had been born Liverpool 1783, the daughter of Walter Lolly a distiller, and Charlotte Andrew who was born in Harpurhey, Manchester in 1791, the daughter of Robert Andrew, a dyer. They were mockingly referred to by Eleanor Butler as the “Lollies and Trollies” because they had long tried to emulate the life style of the Ladies, but with little success.
Having bought the house for £1,400 they proceeded to embellish it, although one visitor of the time commented that “the whole place had a vulgar and commonplace appearance”.
And just as he shows that the much more famous duo weren’t the only ladies of Plas Newydd the author also describes how the international event staged since 1947 wasn’t the only eisteddfod to be sited in Llangollen.
Back in 1858 a large eisteddfod was held in the town which was a precursor of what was to become the National Eisteddfod.
Some of the competitions were a little bizarre, such as “The day labourer whose weekly wage does not exceed £1 with the greatest number of children present at the Eisteddfod able to read and write in Welsh”.
The Flannel Mill generously provided a woollen tent on the bowling green of the Ponsonby Arms. Unfortunately, there was heavy rain before the event, which caused the tent to collapse.
The National Eisteddfod was held here in 1908 at a site off Vicarage Road and was attended by both David Lloyd George and Winston Churchill.
* A Brief History of Llangollen by Peter Jones is available from Llangollen Museum in Parade Street for £4.50.
