THE latest community news from Llanilar

WI

FOR their first meeting in September they held an open evening to welcome villagers to meet members and see what the WI is all about. There is also a book club and craft group which is open to non-members and meets once a month in the community centre on a Friday morning.

The following week they welcomed Hugh Parry, whose hobby was collecting old sound recordings, phonographs and gramophones. He also enjoyed being a DJ using his old wind-up machines. The oldest recording in his collection had been made in 1892 and this he played on a cylinder machine. He then played an original 1918 recording on a 1910 external horn machine.

He progressed through the decades until he played a vinyl record using a diamond stylus on a little 1959 Dansette now using electricity.

Brenda Meade proposed the vote of thanks and Jean Evans won the raffle.

On 19 September, president Hazel Rimmer welcomed Barbara Atkinson, president of Mydroilyn WI. She had brought along quilts she had made over the past 40 years.

She had started quilting when her daughter was young and had carried on to add to her very interesting collection. One of her latest quilts was depicting the tree of life.

The vote of thanks was given by Maureen Edwards and the competition for the evening was a small handmade item which was won by Eirlys Jones, 2nd Betty Wakelin and 3rd Jane Askie.

The last speaker of the month was Prof Robert Meyrick from Aberystwyth University.

He had come to study art in Aberystwyth in 1977 and was made professor in 2004.

He had brought slides of some pictures and ceramics from the art collection which is housed in the art department at Aberystwyth University Old Chemistry building and everyone is welcome to visit. There are 22,000 items in the collection at the museum which they will be visiting later on.

The first major donation to the museum came from George Ernest John Powell with connections to Nanteos. Although he died aged 38 in 1881 he had many items in his collection from oil and water paintings, portraits and engravings by famous and well known artists.

Another well known donation to the Museum came from Sir John Williams a Harley Street surgeon and founder of the National Library of Wales who left his house and contents to the university.

The furniture and Old Masters are now in Plas Penglais, books and manuscripts at the National Library and Lady Williams’ collection of Nantgarw and Swansea porcelain at the Arts Centre. The Davies sisters of Plas Gregynog were also important benefactors.

There is an Endowment Fund and also various grants which enable Prof Meyrick to buy mainly works of young artists needed for students to make the comparison with the works of old masters.

Jayne Hancock thanked Prof Meyrick for a very interesting talk. The competition for the evening was an unusual painting: 1st Sheila Jervis, 2nd Margaret Rees and 3rd Brenda Meade. Sheila won the raffle.

FUGS

LLANILAR-BASED Falcon Useless Golfing Society members continued their close twinning links with Arklow during their 15th visit to play golf against the Bridge Hotel golf society.

Nineteen FUGS members made the five-day trip to play at Wexford and Woodenbridge before competing at Arklow Bay golf course for the Celtic challenge cup.

Over the three rounds the FUGS members played for the CDW Autos trophy for the most consistent golfer and, after a closely contested competition, the overall winner was Clive (Ghostie) Williams.

The Celtic challenge trophy was also keenly contested in superb playing conditions with the Bridge Hotel winning the cup this time.

“The cup only plays a small part in the association between the two countries but the friendships made over the years will last a lifetime,” said FUGS chairman John Murphy.

If you’re a member of a club, society or group, send your news to [email protected]