Leechpool memories

Keith Rees who emigrated to Australia as a young lad in the 1960’s is now retired over there and finding more spare time to fulfil his hobbies. Like many people he enjoys modelling and train sets, which I don’t know very much about. Keith told me of his “helix” and his model village. Never far away from the heart of the man, like many of us, is his early life growing up on the Welsh Land Settlement at Leechpool and he has based his model village on the settlement and here are some photos set out below. He told me that he had to use a little licence with some of his models but I think he should be really proud of what he has achieved. A little bit of Leechpool in New South Wales. Well done Keith!

Fferm Goch memories

I was pleased to hear again from David Coupland. David, who lives in Portsmouth, is the son of Claude Coupland who was the manager at Fferm Goch until he died in 1956.

Claude managed around 20 men who were mainly ex miners. They had quite big dinners at the Red Farm farm house which were attended by members of the management board, some of whom were from Boverton and, possibly head office in Cardiff.

Betty dealt with much of the administrative work.

David believes the man who took over from his father saw the run down and sale of the settlement to a man called Desmond. Subsequent to that, the farm was sold to the Jones family who were believed to be farmers from West Wales.

David moved to no 13 Fferm Goch with his mum, Betty, after his dad’ s death. Mum was very close to Terry and Vera Jones of no 2 who was a very kind lady, especially to David’s mum. They lived at no 13 until 1970.

In his other recollections, David recalls the Newman family, particularly Joyce and Shirley, who he believes married into the Dennis family. 

In the future, David hopes to find some photographs to accompany these memories of his.