Dowlais

The name is derived from the Welsh du meaning 'black' and glais meaning 'stream'.{{cite web | url=https://welsh-dictionary.ac.uk/gpc/gpc.html?du | title=Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru }}{{cite web | url=https://welsh-dictionary.ac.uk/gpc/gpc.html?glais | title=Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru }}

Dowlais came to prominence in the 18th and 19th centuries because of its iron and steelworks. By the mid-1840s there were between 5000 and 7000 men, women and children employed in the Dowlais works.Birch Economic History of the British Iron and Steel Industry p. 255 During the early to mid 1800s the ironworks were operated by Sir John Josiah Guest and (from 1833) his wife Lady Charlotte Guest. Charlotte Guest introduced welfare schemes for the ironworkers. She provided for a church and a library. The school (dating from 1819) was improved and extended, becoming "probably the most important and most progressive not only in the industrial history of South Wales, but of the whole of Britain".Birch Economic History of the British Iron and Steel Industry pp. 291-5 In the 1850s, after Sir John's death, the works became under the control of a board of trustees. In 1865 the Bessemer steel making process was introduced to Dowlais, with £33,000 being spent on a new steelworks.Birch Economic History of the British Iron and Steel Industry p. 358 Steel production at Dowlais eventually ceased in 1936 due to the Great Depression, although the iron foundry continued until 1987.

Dowlais was originally part of the parish of Merthyr Tydfil. In 1872 the population was 15,590.{{cite web|url=http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/20251 |title=Dowlais Glamorgan |website=Vision of Britain |publisher=University of Portsmouth |access-date=17 January 2016 }} (info reproduced from the 1872 Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales) Its total population at the 2011 census was 6,926.{{cite web|url=http://www.ukcensusdata.com/dowlais-w05000709#sthash.UBpocr3h.dpbs|title=Ward population 2011|access-date= 9 November 2015}}

Dowlais was an electoral ward to Mid Glamorgan County Council from 1973 to 1996.{{cite web|title=Mid Glamorgan County Council Election Results 1973-1993|url=http://www.electionscentre.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Mid-Glamorgan-County-1973-1993.pdf|publisher=The Elections Centre (Plymouth University)|access-date=15 April 2019}}

Since 1996 Dowlais has been a ward to Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council. In 2003 Dowlais was represented by an independent councillor, John Pritchard, who was also Mayor of Merthyr Tydfil.{{cite news|url=http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/civic-cheerleader-on-the-taxes-2476834 |title=Civic cheerleader on the taxes |date=1 July 2003 |work=Wales Online |access-date=17 January 2016 }}

File:Yr hen stablau, Dowlais.jpg

Little remains of the works that once sustained the community throughout the Victorian era until the 1930s, the two notable buildings that remain are the Engine House, now used a community centre and the stable block which is now social housing.

Dowlais House, which has now been demolished, was once home to Sir John Josiah Guest and Lady Charlotte Guest, and it was at Dowlais House that Lady Guest translated the Mabinogion. The Guest Memorial Library (1863); commissioned by Lady Guest and designed by Charles Barry, still stands.

St John's Church, a Grade II listed building, contains the tombs and burial places of several notable people, including Sir John Guest who had the church built in 1827. St John's closed in 1997 but has received several hundred thousand pounds of Welsh Government money to preserve it.{{cite news|url=http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/local-news/church-merthyr-tydfil-100k-boost-10353601 |title=Church that hasn't been used for 20 years to get £100k cash boost to help convert it into 20 flats |date=29 October 2015 |work=Wales Online |author=Katie Sands |access-date=16 January 2016 }}

In its heyday, Dowlais had numerous nonconformist chapels. Almost all have disappeared although the buildings of Bethania (Independent) and Hebron (Calvinistic Methodist) are now used by evangelical congregations. Others have been demolished including Bryn Seion and Gwernllwyn.

Dowlais is home to rugby union club, Dowlais RFC.

• Laura Ashley, fashion designer
• Dai Astley, association footballer
• Richard Davies, actor
• Thomas Nathaniel Davies, artist
• David William Evans, lawyer and international rugby union player
• Horace Evans, 1st Baron Evans, royal physician
• Lady Charlotte Guest, first translator of the Mabinogion into English
• Ivor Guest, 1st Baron Wimborne, industrialist
• John Josiah Guest, engineer
• Richard Harrington, actor
• Robert Alwyn Hughes, artist
• Heinz Koppel, artist
• Gustavius Payne, artist
• Robert Rees, tenor
• Glanmor Williams, historian
• Gwyn Alf Williams, historian

• {{Citation|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XVP-AQAAQBAJ&pg=PA255 |author=Birch, Alan |title=Economic History of the British Iron and Steel Industry |year=1967 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=0-415-38248-3 }}
• {{cite book|last=Newman|first=John|author-link=John Newman (architectural historian)|title=Glamorgan|series=The Buildings of Wales|publisher=Penguin Books|location=London|year=1995|url=https://www.worldcat.org/search?q=isbn%3A0140710566|isbn=0-14-071056-6|mode=cs2}}

{{reflist}}

• [http://www.alangeorge.co.uk/Dowlais_Town.htm Old Merthyr Tydfil: Dowlais] - Historical Photographs of Dowlais, Merthyr Tydfil.
• [https://www.geograph.org.uk/search.php?i=6631709 Photos of Dowlais and surrounding area on geograph.org.uk]

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Category:Villages in Merthyr Tydfil County Borough

Category:Communities in Merthyr Tydfil County Borough

Category:Wards of Merthyr Tydfil County Borough

Category:Mid Glamorgan electoral wards