Upper Rhondda - The Second Selection: Images of Wales

Following the success of their first volume of photographs in the Archive Photographs Series, the authors have collected together a further selection of over 200 photographs illustrating the history of this area.

We are taken on a journey in time through the Rhondda Valley, travelling back through the years to discover the places and peoples of yesteryear. Memories of schooldays and growing up are brought to life with the display of schools and streets where education and play took place.

Remarkable events are commemorated in pictorial form - from floods and fires to VE Day celebrations. Working life and the vast changes experienced by employers and employees alike are recorded here - most significantly the disappearance of collieries that once dominated the landscape and the lives of the Rhondda people. Leisure time is enjoyed to the full; in sport (including rugby, cricket and darts) and music (including choirs and operatic societies) and many local events. Places familiar in memory, though perhaps unrecognisable today, are revisited through the pages of this book; hotels and public houses, chapels and churches, shops and schools.

On this second fascinating journey through Upper Rhondda the older inhabitants of the area are granted a further opportunity to remember the rich heritage of their home, with younger residents given a chance to discover their roots.