hammond
  • hammond
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15 years ago
Hello,

I was just leafing through a few old bits of footage on Youtube and i found this old gem, the link is below.

Does anyone know what quarry or quarries this footage was taken in? The shot at the end with the locomotive looks abit like the mill at Meanofferen, but then quite alot of them looked very similar.

[youtube]dw2azVZn0wo[/youtube]

If anyone could enlighten in order the quench my curiosity then i would be very grateful.


[tweak]Clip embedded ;)[/tweak]
JohnnearCfon
15 years ago
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dw2azVZn0wo&feature=related 

It is from the first "talkie" in the Welsh language "Y Chwarelwr" and shows Oakeley Quarry, except the shot of the "Ceir Gwyllt - Wild Cars" which were filmed at Graig Ddu.
Speedycaver
15 years ago
Hammond, good find. :thumbsup:
Fascinating to watch. Never seen people riding down the inclines before. I assume they were riding specially made 'carts'? They must have had some kind of braking system fitted, interesting.
Thanks for the info John.
hammond
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15 years ago
Yeh i know, it's amazing. I love how quickly the load on the incline suddenly accelerates upward, quite terrifying really. Yeh It's known as a 'car gwyllt' or wild car in English for obvious reasons. I've attached a BBC link below with some info on it;

http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/northwest/sites/blaenau/pages/car_gwyllt.shtml 

BTW thanks John for that information, fascinating. Is it possible to get hold of a copy of that? I suppose It would make total sense using the Wild cars at Graig Ddu, since there were a series of very long inclines going all the way from the wildeness into Bleanau. A quick yet terrifying method of getting home.
Speedycaver
15 years ago
Yeh, I watched it a couple of times as I didn't realise the inclines ran that fast. I always assumed they worked at little more than walking pace for some reason. Just shows how powerful the winding gear was.
hymac580c
15 years ago
About 4 years ago you could buy a full length dvd copy of the film 'Chwarelwr' as it was originally made in 3 reels of film about 1930 ish in Blaenau Ffestiniog. The third reel was lost a long time ago, but the script still existed.
So the third part was remade in black and white using actors that resembles the original. Then the whole film was shown on S4C TV.
I'm sure the dvd can still be purchased, but not sure where.
Bellach dim ond swn y gwynt yn chwibian, lle bu gynt yr engan ar cynion yn tincian.
JohnnearCfon
15 years ago
The steam loco shown is Kidbrooke which worked at Oakeley. It is just possible to make out the name. Earlier in that clip you get a glimpse of an internal combustion (petrol) loco (it looks like a dustbin on it's side on wheels!).

The film (about 25 to 30 minutes long) is available on DVD. Although made in the 30s, the last roll of film was missing, so a few years ago they recreated the missing roll. It is almost impossible to tell the difference, it was so well done.
JohnnearCfon
15 years ago
Snap!!!!! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
hammond
  • hammond
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15 years ago
Great, i'll definatly have a look into that. Is there extensive Slate quarry footage or is it just about general life in the area?

Yeh i was going to ask what the hell that was, looked like a complete bodge job of a locomotive. Amazing to think that a reference of something so rare has been captured in such a short piece of film.
JohnnearCfon
15 years ago
No! Believe it or not it was a commercially built loco, Baguley.
hammond
  • hammond
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15 years ago
That's amazing, had no idea such a thing existed, is that what came before the little diesel powered hunsletts?

I just had a little research on the web, and the following link shows one of these that has been saved and apparently this was sold to Oakley during the 20's, could this be the same one?

JohnnearCfon
15 years ago
Oakeley mainly used Ruston & Hornsby diesels, although had 3 of the Baguleys dating from the 1910s. They also had a Ruston Proctor (predecessors of R & H) and a Deutz.
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