THE latest community news from Tywyn

THE latest community news from Tywyn

History society

AT the meeting on Monday, 16 December, the members and residents’ followup session to Jane Kenney’s lecture on Neanderthal society was led by Edwin Salisbury, who gave a talk on the latest techniques of facial reconstruction, used both in archaeology and police forensic work.

These use DNA as well as bone structure.

The talk was followed by brief contributions from 15 members who responded to the invitation to bring an item of historical interest from their own collections.

This challenge proved a fascinating and effective pathway to the group’s interests.

Objects ranged from an impressive fossilised shell to a computer print cartridge, a glimpse of the technological litter that might remain from the present era far into the future.

Two speakers presented objects related to Pharaonic Egypt.

Another talked about carvings of Canadian Inuits she had acquired as a nurse in Canada.

Symbolic objects discussed in their historical context were a Fabergé egg and a ceramic cream cow.

There was also a curious decorated Victorian ceramic air freshener. Items of local interest concerned the Talyllyn Railway’s last journey, a village sacrificed to reservoir development at Nant y moch in 1964, a family history recorded in the family Bible and the diary and rotas of her ancestor, an itinerant Methodist preacher and missionary in Shropshire. There was also a group relating to technological developments, such as the comprehensive volume of navigational tables created by the speaker’s ancestor, Rev James Inman, a Victorian clinometer used for gun ranging and equipment used for valve testing or BBC sound effects, duly demonstrated with deafening results by Ian Dodds, one of the men who designed it.

To sum up, this activity proved a hit, informative as well as enjoyable, reaching other continents and every time period - in several cases revealing a close tie between family history and the history of ideas.

There was an extended refreshment break with mince pies.

The next meeting of the society is on Monday, 20 January, at 7pm in the Baptist Church back room.

Annie Grundy from Tywyn’s Magic Lantern will talk about the history of this cinema and rural cinemas in Wales.

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