Making history himself, by recording it for posterity

‘Youth is preoccupied by the living present, it is only when you are older, and you see time passing and start to look back, that you become interested,’ he says.

‘But by then you find it is too late, that the people who knew these things have passed on and first-hand accounts vanish with them. But who wants to hear stories of the past when you are young?’ Maybe, though, if a youngster paid a visit to Terry’s websites about the history of Ammanford and Llandeilo, they might revise that opinion.

Upon the pages of ammanfordtown.org or llandeilo.org, they will find the tales of our past, from Towy Valley kings and saints to the rise of industry and even a mad scientist who lived in Betws.

Because after 20 years of meticulous research, Terry’s two sites are something of an achievement, drawing together the rich written and oral histories of the two valleys.

This has not been a professional undertaking. It was a ‘hobby’, begun as a way to record the life and times of a town now changing. Born and bred in Tirydail, Terry attended Amman Valley Grammar School before leaving at the age of 18 for London and a job with IBM.

After years of working in IT, at the age of 30 Terry began studying for an English degree at Newcastle University.

However, the death of his father and his mother’s deteriorating health led Terry home and eventually to his history research. Explains Terry: ‘I had been away for 25 years and when I returned in 1990 I saw a marked change in the town. The buildings, fields and even pathways I remembered as a child were going.

‘I don’t have a background in history but I knew I wanted to record Ammanford’s past before it was too late.’ However, this was a time before the internet.

‘The internet has proven a rich vein. You can Google anything, see maps and photographs and find books which are out of print,’ explains Terry. ‘But when I started I had to find people to talk to, people who remembered the wars and the history of the mines.

‘But oral histories were difficult as you then needed to verify the facts. Stories from memories can become confused and facts incorrect or mixed up. It was a long process and I would spend hours in libraries surrounded by dusty books and documents.

‘It was hard work, the further you go back the harder it becomes as you find many of the documents were written in old Welsh or pre-Roman Latin.

‘So when the internet came along it helped immensely in finding things and doing a website means that I can update it and correct things as I go along.’ As Terry’s research began, he discovered the town now called Ammanford was first mentioned in 800AD. From there he has been able to chronicle its history through the coal revolution that changed the face of the town to its eventual decline.

‘Ammanford’s history is that of coal. You can’t throw a stone here without hitting someone with a family mining background. The town’s story is an important one with important people, but hardly romantic like the history of, say, Llandeilo.

‘There you have stories of kings, Romans, Henry VIII, battles, lords and mansions. A far cry from the grimy coal face,’ he says.

There have been few surprises then? ‘Occasionally you come across something that is a little different,’ he explains. ‘Such as stories that only a hundred years ago people suffering from rabies were smothered to death – they do add some colour to it all.

‘And when you do find something new, or suddenly spot something and make a new find it is very satisfying.’ Terry says one of his aims has been to encourage an interest in history for residents. He would also like Ammanford to preserve what historic buildings and sites it has left.

‘These days only College Street and the Square remain, we have lost that heritage of the old buildings and shops. It could be any town now, anywhere.

‘You look around and wonder how they could have knocked down those beautiful yellow brick buildings of College Street or feel saddened by the loss of our old police station.’ ‘Buildings are destroyed and crudely renovated and it is sad to see, we are losing living history.

‘Llandeilo has fared better in that respect, but then it is a more prosperous place and the buildings Victorian or Georgian.’ These days Terry spends less time on the sites and researching then he once did.

As secretary of Ammanford History and Archaeology Society he finds his time taken up with that, talks and writing articles for Carmarthenshire Life and of course, The Guardian.

‘It is fun doing those articles,’ he says, ‘it is satisfying to present these stories in a readable way to those who don’t have the internet or for older readers.’ The sites, meanwhile, have proved to be popular and informative. So much so, that The National Library of Wales has recently archived the Ammanford site to preserve it for the future.

So how does it feel to think that in the future, budding historians will be using his site as a resource in their research?

‘I'm proud of what I have achieved with the sites and very proud that the National Library want to keep it as a permanent record, but what I’d really like to do is to write a book," he says.

‘It is something I will need to plan and will need discipline to do. These days even if a book only has a print run of, say, a thousand, someday in the future, some library will have a copy on their shelf for someone to be able to use.

‘And despite the internet being so useful books are so much better. You can’t beat settling down in a comfy chair with a cup of tea and an interesting book.’ For more information on Terry’s work visit www.ammmanfordtown.org.uk and www.llandeilo.org.uk