I was looking at a map of North Wales this morning,
preparing for this deep dive, and I honestly
got a little confused right off the bat. Oh,
yeah. How so? Well, I typed in the name of our
topic, Mayni Bridge, and the map dropped a pin
on, you know, a bridge. Right. Makes sense. It
does. But then I zoomed out a tiny bit, and the
pin was actually sitting on a cluster of houses
and streets next to the bridge. Ah, yes. That
is a very common point of confusion for people
looking at the area. So just to be absolutely
clear with you and everyone listening, we're
not spending the next chunk of time talking about
suspension cables and iron chains, are we? We
might mention them in passing, but no. Today
we're looking at the town itself, the actual
community that sits right in the shadow of that
famous structure. Okay, good. Because looking
at the geographical and historical records we
have for the town of Manai Bridge in Anglesey,
this place feels like it has a serious split
personality. It really does. I mean, it's got
a name that belongs to a piece of infrastructure,
but a history that goes back way further. You've
got a fake TV set built inside a garage and then
a very real promenade built by refugees. That
is a fantastic way to frame our mission today.
It's a town of disguises. On the surface, to
you and me driving through, it looks like a scenic
crossing point. Yeah, a postcard spot. Exactly.
But if you dig into the local records, you find
a prison ship for naughty boys, you find ancient
hermits, and a community that has just constantly
reinvented itself to survive. So the place is
known in English as Menai Bridge. But if you
went back in time to, say, the year 1500 and
asked a local for directions to Menai Bridge...
You'd get completely blank stares. Right. Because
there was no bridge. Right. For the vast majority
of its history, this place wasn't defined by
a bridge at all. It was defined by the water.
The Welsh name for the town is Porthaethwy. Porthaethwy,
which is a bit of a mouthful if you aren't used
to speaking Welsh. It can be. Yeah. But it breaks
down quite logically if we look at the etymology.
Okay, let's break it down. So Porth means harbor
or port. Okay, pretty straightforward. And the
second part, Daethwy. That refers to a local
Celtic tribe. And later it became the name of
a medieval administrative district, what they
called a Cmote, named Din Dethwe. So literally
translated, it's the port of the Dethwe tribe.
Exactly. Port of the Dethwe. That immediately
changes the vibe for me. Like Menai Bridge sounds
like civil engineering. Port of the Dethwe sounds
like a settlement with really deep ancient roots.
And those roots go deep specifically because
of the geography. If you look at the Menai Strait,
That's the strip of water separating the island
of Anglesey from the Welsh mainland. It is not
a uniform width. No, it pinches in. Yes. This
specific spot where the town sits is the narrowest
point. The ultimate bottleneck. The bottleneck.
So if you were, say, a Roman soldier in the first
century. and you wanted to cross over to crush
the Druids on Anglesey. Which they did. Which
they absolutely did. Or if you were a cattle
drover in the Middle Ages trying to get your
herd to market, this is where you crossed. It
was the shortest distance over some very treacherous
water. So long before the suspension bridge,
this was basically a fairy town. A massive fairy
hub. We have written records of the ferry operating
there, going all the way back to 1292. Wow, 1292.
And it almost certainly operated for centuries
before anyone bothered to write it down. The
entire economy was maritime. The whole town was
essentially a waiting room for the tide. I just
imagine that creates a very specific kind of
atmosphere, you know, just hundreds of people
constantly passing through, staring at the water,
waiting for it to calm down enough to cross.
It creates a very transient bustling energy.
But then. The year 1826 arrives. Enter Thomas
Telford. Exactly. Thomas Telford builds his magnificent
suspension bridge. And suddenly overnight, you
don't need the ferry anymore. Which sounds like
an absolute economic disaster for a town built
around a ferry. Did the local economy just collapse?
You would really think so. Yeah. But this is
where the town's resilience first shows up in
the sources. The ferry business died. Yes. But
the town pivoted. They started using their waterfront
for shipbuilding. They became a major hub for
timber export. It became a serious commercial
center in its own right. They essentially refused
to just become a drive -through for the bridge
traffic. They adapted. Speaking of the waterfront,
you mentioned it's the narrowest point, but looking
at the geographical charts, it also looks like
the messiest point of the street. Oh, without
a doubt. Like, it's not just open water. There
are rocks and little islands everywhere. It's
basically a mini archipelago within a strait.
It is incredibly treacherous if you don't know
exactly what you're doing. The locals actually
call this stretch of water the Swellies. The
Swellies. That sounds kind of cute, but I'm guessing
it's not. It is not cute. The tidal currents
are ferocious. They swirl and pull. But right
off the shore, you have these little islands
dotted around. Eunice Feilog, Eunice Gaint, Eunice
Castel. And the really notable one, Church Island.
Yes, Enos Tisilio. That is personally my favorite
spot for understanding the hidden layers of this
town. You can actually walk out to it today across
a short causeway. I've seen pictures of this
in our research. It looks incredibly peaceful.
You've got this old stone church surrounded by
trees, but it's right next to this massive, noisy
modern bridge. That's the perfect contrast. Back
in the 9th century, a saint named Tisilio lived
on that island as a hermit. Wait, a hermit? right
in the middle of a busy crossing point. Well,
he chose it specifically because at high tide,
the water completely cut him off from the mainland.
It forced isolation. I always find that kind
of historical irony so funny. You know, a guy
picks a rock in the freezing water specifically
to get away from people. Right. And 1200 years
later, we literally build a causeway so tourists
can just stroll out and stand exactly where he
was trying to be left alone. It is deeply ironic.
But that little island is sort of the spiritual
ancestor of the town. Even today, the modern
town of Menai Bridge is officially part of the
parish of Landisilia. Oh, named after him. Exactly.
So you have the flashy, heavy engineering of
Telford's Bridge on one side, and then the quiet,
stubborn spirituality of this 9th century hermit
on the other. But looking at the area today,
the water isn't just about ancient history or
religion, is it? Because when I was reading up
on the current layout of the town, I noticed
a huge cluster of science facilities. You did.
Menai Bridge is actually home to the School of
Ocean Sciences, which is part of Bangor University.
Why there? I mean, is it just for the nice view
of the strait? Not at all. It's precisely because
of those ferocious currents we just talked about.
The swellies, the extreme tides, the unique biodiversity
of that bottleneck. It serves as a living laboratory
literally on their doorstep. That's amazing.
They even have a dedicated research ship, the
Prince Mad Dog. You'll very often see it docked
right at the town pier. So the exact same treacherous
water that kept Roman soldiers at bay is now
attracting marine scientists from all over the
world. Precisely. It's a really beautiful continuity.
The town has always looked to the straight for
his living, whether that's ferrying, shipbuilding,
or now oceanography. But, and I want to shift
gears here, looking at the historical sources,
the water wasn't always a place of learning or
holiness. There is a chapter in the records here
that genuinely creeped me out. I think I know
where you're going. The HMS Clio? Yes, the Clio.
This is definitely the darker side of the Victorian
era coming to Midnight Bridge. Because when I
first saw the name HMS Clio in the notes, I thought,
oh, a nice historic ship for tourists to look
at. But the locals back then didn't see it that
way at all, did they? No, they didn't. For nearly
50 years, from 1877 all the way to 1920, this
massive wooden battleship was moored permanently
in the strait, and it cast a very long, very
dark shadow over the town. The local rumor was
that it was a prism, like a floating Alcatraz
for kids. That was the local folklore. It was
so intimidating that mothers in Mani Bridge would
actually use it as a threat. They'd point out
to the water and say, behave yourself, or I'll
send you to the Clio. That is some terrified
Victorian parenting right there. It worked. But
was it actually a prison? If you look at the
official records, what was it? Technically speaking,
no, culturally, maybe. Officially, it was classified
as an industrial training ship. What does that
mean? It was run by the North Wales Society.
The goal was to take young men, we're talking
boys aged 11 to 15, who are considered destitute
or, quote, in need of discipline. In need of
discipline. That is such a loaded, vague, Victorian
phrase. It really is. It heavily implies that
being poor and having bad behavior are the exact
same thing. Right. The whole idea was to take
these wild, impoverished boys and industrialize
them, turn them into useful, obedient sailors
for the British Empire. So they taught them what?
Sailing stuff? Yes. knots, navigation, repairing
sails, swabbing decks. The catch is they couldn't
leave. They absolutely could not leave. They
were stuck on that ship. And the discipline was
notoriously harsh. The historical records show
that corporal punishment using the birch and
the cane was extremely common. Some accounts
even described it as openly cruel. Yes, it was
a brutal environment. It's such a jarring visual
to think about. You know, you have these wealthy
Victorian tourists coming from London to admire
Telford's beautiful, elegant bridge. And right
below them, moored in the freezing water, is
this wooden ship full of trapped 11 -year -old
boys being beaten into submission. It reflects
the Victorian mindset perfectly, doesn't it?
Yeah. They built an iron bridge to conquer nature,
and they used a wooden ship to conquer human
nature. It was all entirely about control. I
want to completely flip the script now, because
we just talked about boys being trapped in Menai
Bridge against their will. But just a few years
later, just up the road, you had a group of people
arriving who were incredibly desperate to be
there. Yes. We're moving forward to 1914 now,
the outbreak of the First World War. The Belgian
refugees. This is a story that I think really
defines the true heart of the town. When the
German army invaded Belgium. A group of refugees
fleeing the city of Mechelen managed to make
it all the way across Europe to Menai Bridge.
And the town just took them in. They did. Open
arms. They were housed in local homes in the
village hall. People shared what little they
had. But here is where the historical records
get really fascinating. Yeah, the skill set of
these refugees. Exactly. These weren't just general
laborers. The sources note that many of these
men from Mechelen were highly skilled in marketry.
Mark, just so everyone is on the same page, that's
like fancy wood inlay, right? Like making those
intricate geometric patterns on expensive cabinets
and furniture. Exactly that. It is highly delicate,
precise indoor work. It requires soft hands,
fine tools, a warm workshop. But these refugees
wanted to say thank you to the town that saved
them. They did. And they didn't have any money
to give. So they decided to build something for
the community. But they didn't build a giant
communal cabinet. No, they did not. They decided
to build a massive stone promenade right along
the edge of the Menai Strait. I just cannot get
over that image. You have these fine artisans,
men who are used to working with delicate veneers
and varnishes out there in the Welsh weather,
hauling heavy limestone rocks, battling those
freezing tides we talked about just to build
a seawall. It is a profound gesture of gratitude.
Yeah. They took that craftsman's patience. the
same patience needed for fine woodwork, and applied
it to brute civil engineering. Where exactly
did they build it? The path runs from Church
Island, where our hermit was, all the way down
to another little tidal island called Carragher
-Hallon. They worked on it manually for two solid
years, from 1914 to 1916. And the craziest part
is, it's still there. You can go walk on it today.
You can. It's officially known as the Belgian
Promenade. Now, full disclosure, it was heavily
rebuilt in the 1960s to reinforce it. But the
soul of it, the actual foundation, is still that
original refugee labor. There's a really touching
note in the sources here about a ceremony they
held in 1965. Yes, when they officially reopened
the rebuilt promenade. The town managed to track
down the only surviving refugee from that original
1914 group. A man named Edward Wilhomes. Yes,
and he came back to Menai Bridge to cut the ribbon.
That just brings it full circle in such a beautiful
way. It wasn't just a construction project for
them, it was their permanent mark on the world.
A message saying, we were here, you helped us
survive, and this is the path we left behind
for you. It stands in such stark, striking contrast
to the HMS Clio. Oh, completely. The ship was
a symbol of punishment and confinement. And then
right next to it, physically right next to it
on the strait, the promenade is a symbol of refuge
and openness. It's amazing. And you know, this
theme of hidden layers just keeps coming up in
this deep dive. We have the hidden history of
the refugees, the hidden history of the boys
on the ship. There is a part of Menai Bridge
that is literally hidden in plain sight because
it's completely fake. Ah, yes. You've discovered
the town's Hollywood connection. Well, Hollywood
might be stretching it a bit. Maybe Welsh Hollywood.
I'm talking about the TV show. Bound around.
It is a very, very popular soap opera broadcast
on the Welsh language television channel S4C,
and it has been filmed right in the town for
years. But they didn't just point cameras at
the existing streets. They actually terraformed
parts of the town to fit the script. They did.
There is a garage. right in the town center.
An old, disused commercial garage building that
the production company Rondo Media basically
took over. And what did they do to it? They converted
the entire front facade of this garage into a
fake row of shops. So if you're a tourist you
could be walking down the main street looking
for a snack and you see what looks like a nice
little cafe or a newsagent. And you try to open
the door and it's just a flat wooden set built
onto the brickwork of a garage. That sums up
that Town of Disguises theme we started with
so perfectly. You look at it and ask, is it a
garage? No, it's a bakery. Wait, is it a bakery?
No, it's a television set. It really blurs the
line for the locals too. Imagine you see your
own real town on television every single night,
but the town on TV is full of manufactured drama
and businesses that don't actually exist. It
adds this layer of total surrealism to daily
life there. It does. Speaking of surrealism and
drama, we absolutely have to talk about the fair.
Fair Borth. Because if the TV set is fake chaos,
the sources make this sound like real unadulterated
chaos. Oh, it is absolute controlled chaos. This
is a massive tradition in the town, dating all
the way back to 1691. 1691. So again, long before
Telford's bridge even existed. Centuries before.
It originally started as a horse fair, then it
evolved into a livestock market. Today, it's
mostly modern fairground rides, food stalls,
and games. But when we say fair, we need to clarify
for you listening. Don't picture a nice, polite
little event in a grassy field on the outskirts
of town. No, not at all. Where is it held? It
is in the town. Right in the streets. The rides,
the waltzers, the bumper cars, the stalls, they
physically occupy the main streets of Menai Bridge.
The normal traffic completely stops. The town
is just taken over by neon lights and machinery.
I love that intensity. It's terribly inconvenient.
for anyone trying to get to work, but it is tradition
and tradition wins. And the locals are incredibly
stubbornly specific about the timing of it, too.
The records say it is always held on October
24th. Always. Every single year. Unless? Unless
October 24th happens to fall on a Sunday. Ah,
the Sunday rules. You simply cannot disrupt the
Welsh Sabbath with bumper cars and cotton candy.
So if the 24th is a Sunday, they begrudgingly
move it to the 23rd of the 25th. There's a little
piece of poetry about this fair that you shared
in our notes. I think it captures the sensory
overload of it perfectly. And the Old Welsh stanza,
yes. It translates roughly into English as, Warm
beer and kick. It sounds like a very distinct,
slightly chaotic Walsh version of Hig. It's all
about anticipation. You have to remember, in
a very hard, weather -beaten agricultural life,
that this one day in October was the explosion
of color and noise and socialization for the
whole year. It really mattered. And it still
does. By the way, while we're talking about culture,
we should quickly drop in a couple of pop culture
nods the town gets. Lewis Carroll actually mentions
Manai Bridge in a nonsense song in Through the
Looking Glass. does. The White Knight sings about
it. And Alun Owen, the screenwriter who wrote
the Beatles movie A Hard Day's Night, he's a
notable person from the area too. A lot of creativity
concentrated around that straight. Okay, looking
at the time, we've got space for two more hidden
things from the sources. One is a hidden garden,
and the other is a stump that frankly seems physically
impossible. Let's start with the garden, plus
Kettan. The Hidden Gardens. This is a fascinating
story of resilience, very similar to the spirit
of the town itself. Plus, Cadenon is a sprawling
200 -acre estate tucked away in a valley near
the bridge. But for decades, it was completely
overgrown, just lost to the brambles. Like a
literal jungle. Essentially, yes, nature took
it back. But then a man named Anthony Taverner
bought the property and spent nearly 20 years
painstakingly restoring it. He was uncovering
old stone walls, historic waterfalls, hidden
river paths. It was becoming a masterpiece. And
then the year 2015 happened? Boxing Day 2015.
Massive, unprecedented floods hit the region.
The old walls of the garden were violently breached.
The floodwater just scoured the valley floor.
Oh no. They washed away rare, mature plants,
completely destroyed the historic paths. 20 years
of meticulous daily work just gone in a single
night. That is genuinely heartbreaking. It was
devastating. But much like the town did when
the ferry closed centuries earlier, they didn't
pack up and quit. They immediately started rebuilding.
And they managed to reopen parts of it by Easter
the very next year. That stubbornness again.
The absolute refusal to be beaten by the elements.
Exactly. Okay, finally, the stunt. We've talked
about the suspension bridge hovering over the
town this whole time. But in 1918, someone decided
to interact with that bridge in a way that sounds
certifiably insane. You're talking about Major
Thomas Elmhurst. November 12th, 1918. Which is
the exact day after World War I ended. Right.
The armistice has just been signed. Everyone
is euphoric. The relief is palpable. Elmhurst
is the commanding officer of the Royal Naval
Airship Station located on Anglesey. And he decides
he wants to celebrate. By flying an airship.
Where? Exactly. Under the Menai Bridge. Now hold
on. Let's visualize this for everyone. An airship.
We are talking about a blip. A massive gas -filled
balloon. And the Menai Bridge is a suspension
bridge with thick iron chains hanging down over
a narrow gorge. Yes. The clearance between the
water and the bridge is only about 100 feet at
high tide. That's nothing. And an airship is
not a precision instrument like a modern drone.
It is massive, sluggish, and highly susceptible
to wind. And as we've well established, a strait
is incredibly windy. So he takes this massive,
highly flammable bag of hydrogen, flies it down
the rocky gorge, and tries to thread the needle
between the choppy water and the iron chains.
He did. He flew an SSE 73 airship right under
the deck. And he survived. That has to be the
ultimate hold my beer moment of 1918. It's an
incredible visual that really sticks with you.
Think about it. The Great War is finally over,
the entire world has changed, and this giant
futuristic silver shape is gliding silently under
Telford's 19th century stone arches. Wow. It's
a singular moment where the heavy engineering
of the bridge and the daring of the pilot just
perfectly aligned. It's such a cinematic image
to end our deep dive on. You know, we started
this by pointing out that most people just drive
right over the bridge and never bother to look
down at the town. And hopefully going through
these sources today has shown you why that is
a massive mistake. I think we definitely have,
because when you drive over, you're just crossing
a gap. But if you actually stop, get out, and
go down to the water, you realize you're standing
in a place where Roman legions marched, where
Saint prayed alone, where destitute boys were
locked on a freezing ship, where great refugees
built stone walls and where a guy flew a blimp
underneath you. It really is a perfect microcosm
of Welsh history. The bridge gets all the glossy
photo ops, but the town holds all the real stories.
It brings me right back to that fake TV garage
we talked about earlier. How so? Well... We travel
to places all the time and we look at the official
sites, right? The castles, the bridges, the things
that are printed on the postcards. But those
are often just the sets. The real drama, the
actual human story, is usually hidden in the
weeds or under the water or in a wall built by
a guy who used to make cabinets in Belgium. That
is exactly the difference between casual sightseeing
and true understanding. The fake shops on the
TV set remind us that we always need to look
closer at what is actually real. Exactly. So
next time you cross a bridge, any bridge really,
maybe you take a second to wonder what's going
on underneath it. Thank you for taking this Deem
Dive with us. It's been a real pleasure. Catch
you next time.