THE life of a campaigning former Cambrian News editor and those of memorable women from Aberystwyth will be celebrated with walks around the town.

On Saturday, 7 July, there will be two walks around the centre of Aberystwyth to celebrate the lives of memorable women connected with the town during the last 200 years - among them an artist, a sailor, a poet, a botanist, a singer, a lawyer, a wood-carver, a business woman and the vice-chair of CND Wales.

The women to be featured range from Elizabeth Crebar (1754-1833), a poet who lived in Pier Street for some years and (as well as many other things) mentioned in her poetry the tourist and fishing industries in Aberystwyth, to the artist Mary Lloyd Jones and Sue Jones Davies, included for her roles as town councillor and mayor, as an actress and singer, and for her work with Fair Trade, Freedom from Torture and refugee organisations.

Like Sue, some of the other women to be featured operated in several different areas: at different times in her life Olwen Davies (1924-2011) was an opera singer in Rome and a translator for the UN as well as vice-chair of Wales CND; Cranogwen (Sarah Jane Rees) (1839-1916) was a poet, journalist, schoolmistress, seafarer, preacher, lecturer and teacher of navigation; and Mabel Pakenham Walsh (1937-2013) was a wood-carver and artist as well as a campaigner for the rights of the disabled.

Marguerite Jervis (1886-1964) is best known for her blockbuster romantic novels. She was also an actress and screenwriter whose special connection with Aberystwyth (apart from living in Portland Street for some years) is that she converted a garage behind the Queen’s Hotel into a theatre and ran a theatre company there, which performed plays by Noel Coward, Emlyn Williams and Ivor Novello, among others.

Because numbers are limited, places on the walks should be booked in advance by emailing [email protected]

Read the full feature in this week’s Cambrian News, on sale now