Penarth Dock, South Wales - the heritage and legacy

Volume Eight - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - Even more aspects - More Moments Captured in Time . . .



• Dinas Powis from Wellwood Drive - A view of the village with its Barry Railway Company station (opened December 1888) in the foreground taken from the high ground nearby Bryn-y-Don school. To the right of the station the signal box may be seen but hand painted by the postcard artist with a green base. I recall this painted in GWR livery i.e. chocolate brown and cream. I used to visit the signalman as a child and steal his biscuits whilst my Dad and him were chatting away! Just in front of the white gate is a single track line which used to take goods to and from the old Gwalia brickworks and adjacent sawmills in the former quarry. This area was built upon and St. Cadoc's Avenue, St. Illtyd Close and St. Teilo Close grace the site today. The postcard was published by F. John, Post Office, Dinas Powis and has a postdate during September 1907. I used to go to school at Dinas Powis Primary, Cadoxton Secondary Modern and Barry C.o.F.E. with a good friend Robert John who lived in Michlaeston-le-Pit (Llanfihangel-y-pwll). Another Heritage postcard from the Penarth Dock Collection. [001] [20200115]


• Dinas Powis Signal Box - A view from the west-bound platform taken during January 1955. The engine is a 'Hall' class no. 5937 which has been diverted probably due to track repairs on the main line as was common-place for Sunday services. The photograph is borrowed from Chrystal Tilney's fine book of Archive pictures of Dinas Powis etc. The signal box, as I recall, was in place until the end of the steam era during the early 1960's by which time the sidings, loading bays and the extension line to the brickworks had been removed. [659] [20200115]


• Dinas Powis Railway Station Staff - A photograph of the station staff at an unknown date, borrowed from Chrystal Tilney's 'Scenes and Characters of Old Dinas Powys'. She comments ; 'and there are the old familiar accessories of a railway station in the days of steam - the gas lamps, metal advertisements, wooden walls, chocolate and weighing machines, and a platform garden edged with white-washed stones. . . It was probably the last place in the village to cling to the spelling " Dynas Powis " current at the end of the last (but one!) century, and the intrusive " y " could still be seen under the black-out paint when all stations were blotted out during the Second World War.' [1009]