JONES, THOMAS OWEN ('Gwynfor ', 1875 - 1941), librarian, dramatist, actor and producer
Pseudonym: Gwynfor
Date of birth: 1875
Date of death: 1941
Parent: Ellen Jones
Parent: William Jones
Gender: Male
Occupation: librarian, dramatist, actor and producer
Area of activity: Literature and Writing; Performing Arts
Author: Thomas Elwyn Griffiths
Born 19 January 1875 in Pwllheli, Caernarfonshire, son of William and Ellen Jones, New Street. He was educated at the town council school and then apprenticed in a local grocery shop. Between 1916 and 1917 he kept his own business at Caernarfon before being appointed county librarian on a salary of £130 per annum. This was the first county library established in Wales and was located in two rooms at Plas Llanwnda, Castle Street, Caernarfon. It appears that the appointment was a temporary one at first but Gwynfor visited the headquarters of the Carnegie Trust in Dunfermline for a while to equip himself for the new post, in a period when scant attention was paid to librarianship as a profession. Gwynfor excelled in the field of drama and he became famous throughout Wales as an actor and producer with his drama company, Y Ddraig Goch. He published a number of his own plays, Y briodas ddirgel (1915), Trem yn ôl (1920, 2 ed.), Perthnasau (1922), Y llo aur a lloi eraill (1925), Eiddo pwy? (1935), Troi'r byrddau (1935), Tywydd mawr (1939), and a book of short stories, Straeon (1931). He was good company with a stock of stories and traditions about Y Maes (Castle Square) in Caernarfon. He was a keen follower of eisteddfodau and he was a drama adjudicator at the national eisteddfod many times. His office at the library became a popular meeting place for leading literary figures in the area, like E. Morgan Humphreys, Meuryn (R.J. Rowlands) and Cynan (Sir Cynan (Albert) Evans-Jones). He was one of the first to broadcast in Welsh from Manchester in the 1930s. He died 22 August 1941 and was buried in Llanbeblig cemetery, Caernarfon : his epitaph reads 'Actor da, Cymro da, Cristion da' (A good actor, Welshman and Christian).
Author
- Thomas Elwyn Griffiths
- 'Caernarfonshire and its libraries; development of the first County Library in Wales', Caernarvonshire Historical Society Transactions, 1972
- O. Llew Owain, Hanes y ddrama yng Nghymru, 1850-1943 (Liverpool 1948)
- local newspapers
- E. Wyn James in Ysgrifau Beirniadol, 23 (1997), 208-40
Sources
- Wikidata: Q20734512
Additional Links
Published date: 2001
Article Copyright: http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/
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