First Welsh Photo

It’s interesting to be taking photos here as very few people know Margam Park was the location of the earliest known Welsh photograph. It was a daguerreotype of the castle taken on 9 March 1841 by the Reverend Calvert Richard Jones. A daguerreotype is an early type of photograph that was produced on a silver-plated copper sheet. The Reverend Jones was a pioneer of photography and a friend of William Henry Fox Talbot, who was also a frequent visitor to Margam Park and experimented with his own photographic methods. The Margam daguerreotype is now kept at the National Library of Wales and is considered a valuable historical document.

In the early 19th century, the estate passed to the Talbot family, who built “Margam Castle”c a neo-Gothic country house that was designed by Thomas Hopper and completed in 1840. The castle was the seat of the Talbot family until the end of the Second World War, when it was used by the army and suffered from neglect and vandalism.

In 1973, the Margam Estate was acquired by Glamorgan County Council, and in 1977, the park was opened to the public. Since then, the park has been restored and enhanced, offering a variety of attractions and activities for visitors, such as a sculpture park, a farm trail, a narrow gauge railway, a fairytale village, and a discovery centre.

Margam Park is a place of exceptional historic and scenic value, and has some of the country’s finest architectural treasures in its magnificent setting. It is a rare and valuable learning resource and a heritage attraction of considerable distinction.

I hope you enjoyed learning about its history. 😊

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