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Published: November 12th 2021
I found myself walking up a street at Coedpoeth . Too early for the hairdresser . If I went in now I would have to hope she would let me in , sit in a corner without any magazine to read and not drink a welcoming coffee. It feels as if we never will return to magazines on the shelves to read whilst waiting for a hair cut . Nor a coffee to pass the time away. I decided to walk up the road toward the War Memorial and the Carnegie Library and Snooker Room . Coedpoeth has a worn down feeling . The houses were once grand . Now the doors lack any patina and the stone is dulled by the blackness from years of mining dust , iron deposits and grime . I wondered whether I would prefer them left as they blended in or whether it would be better to power wash them all clean . The church was even grubby . Coedpoeth was a religious village as were most of the rural villages of Wales . They defined the area with Wesleyan, Calvanistic and Independent Chapels . Many down Smelt Road where i was walking. Some English
speaking chapels but many welsh . Tabernacle Chapel catered for the Baptists of the village , Adwy and Bethel Chapels the Calavistic Methodist Bethel and Salem the Congregationalists Batharfarn the Methodist and Horeb the Wesleyans . Rehoboth the Welsh speaking Wesleyans . Every possible colour of religion was catered for in the village , Now hardly any remain . In fact most are either empty and derelict , knocked down and housing replacing them or they have been convereted to houses .
The Snooker Hall and Reading room had not shared the same fate . It had been endowed by the philantropist Andrew Carnegie . The early years of the 20th century was a period of great change in Britain with education taking centre stage in moving the working man upward . Education was seen as the key and Coedpoeth was no different . The Parish council in 1904 amongst other things considered the need for a free library in the village and it was in front of that building I now stood. Again darkened with age and grim it looked sturdy but blackened . Not a pretty building compared to the library in Wrexham but utilitarian . The
choice of location was chosen by the council and it would face Nant Road . The council specified not only the direction the building took but set the size of its entrance hall to be 7 foot wide . The work was given to the architect William Moss who was told that the ground floor shoudl contain a refreshment room no doubt to stop the men of the village from hard drinking and that there should be a games room . Upstairs would consist of a reading room, cloak room and Council room. There will also be a caretaker’s house adjoining”. the e work was to be paid for by a grant of £1,500 from Andrew Carnegie, the steel magnate, who funded 660 new libraries in the UK and Ireland between 1881 and 1917. I wondered how many philantropists there are now who would donate so much money to building such things as libraries these days . They prefer to race each other in balloons or race to the edge of space instead .
It appears that four builders tendered for the work and it was given to Mr Samuel Moss in April 1904 who was told that the
work should be completed by October 1904 and the building costs were set at £1200. At that time baths and water were not always available to householders and the Free Library Committee also agreed to the provision of two baths within the library building at an additional cost of £45 to fulfill their duty under the Baths and Washhouses Act. A precept on one penny in the pound was set for the library and this was to help with its running costs. The building was completed on the first day of October 1904 , I guess that this was what was written on the commemoration stone but the sun was low and the stone black. I could not read it nor photograph it . The local Penygelli Stone had darkened with age , It was good to read though that all the materials were local with lime bought from the local lime works given much needed work to the locals . I could imagine the men coming home from work and playing billiards on the new billiard tables , drinking cocoa in the refreshment rooms and picking up books to read . The wives too could visit and borrow books
or meet for cocoa . The parish room was available for wedding receptions and parish meetings . The booksheves were pitch pine and the Wrexham Gas Light Company were contracted to supply incandescent burners at a cost of £20 12s 6d which made the building available for use in the evenings . A caretaker was employed at a salary of 6s per week. and a librarian at a salary of 12s “with house, fire and light”. It was lovely to see the building still fulfilled its original use as a snooker hall , library and parish room .
I left the library with still time on my hands . I found myself thinking that it was almost Rememberence Sunday . We had been under lockdown through two Springs . two Summers . two Autumns and one winter with another just round the corner . Leaving my thoughts behind me I stood outside the gates to the war memorial and its garden . The gates and railing were newly painted and looked pristine . The gardens were neat and tidy with winter pansies planted . Whites, mauves and yellows . The backdrop was Mineral Mountain ."Its a fine view " she said . The lady walking her dog had stopped just across from me . I agreed . She told me she loved the view of the ever changing mountain . Green in Spring , purple heather in the late summer , yellow in autumn . Snow in winter . "It is a lovely place for a war memorial " I had to agree . The memorial comprised of a polished granite column with triangulated top supporting a full length sculpture of a soldier with head bowed and rifle reversed. As I looked at the memorial I wondered about the story behind it . Each town or village has a war memorial raised mostly from subscriptions. I wondered who or why a village chose a certain style of memorial , Was it a case of money ? The more money you raised the more elaborate the memorial . Some villages chose a simple cross , others a soldier or sailor on a plinth. Some with rifles , some with arms around children protecting them . Was there a catalogue to choose the design from ? Some were plaques upon a wall . Some Art deco in design . All are different in a way from each other and reflect the styles of the period and show how fashions change even in the design of a war memorial .
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John and Sylvia
John Wallace & Sylvia Bowman Wallace
Books and magazines
Hi Jen. I always enjoy your blogs. I was going to suggest you used a library but then read on further in your blog and saw you did. Where I live in Oz, as well as Public Libraries we also have community libraries. Usually it is a small box with books that you take/borrow as long as you put another book in its place. They are very popular. I don't know whether you have the "Men's Shed" movement in Wales but here they are happy to make the borrowing boxes for free and the local council installs them beside walking paths and other public areas so they are easily accessible. Just a thought.