Glyntaff Estate 30th Anniversary Celebrations
*The 30th Anniversay of the Glyntaff Estate and GTRA
(Glyntaff Tennants and Residents Association)
*The 21st Anniversary of the first Credit Union in Wales (now Dragon Savers)
which started on the estate in 1989
*The 11th Anniversary of GTFM, the first Community Radio station in Wales,
which started on the estate in 1999 (see below for 10th Anniversary event)
The Celebration on Friday 14th May
at The Labour Club, Rhydyfelin
was officially launched at 11am by Jane Davidson AM
....who also planted a couple of trees with local youngsters to mark the occasion
Other events included: Reflections and Stories about the Estate;
A Theatre performance by a local school; A Question Time Panel;
Vision of The Future
Then in the evening from 7pm:
Local singing legend Iris Williams received two (or more) standing ovations from a 'full house' audience for her exceptional performance after travelling from New York to top the bill at this special concert. She was involved in the launch 21 years ago of the Rhydyfelin Credit Union which has since developed into Dragon Savers, as well as being a firm supporter of both the Estate community and GTFM, on which she has appeared many times. Also giving excellent performances at this event, which was staged by RCT County Borough Council, were Cor Meibion Pontypridd, The Richard Williams Singers and pupils from Hawthorn High School. The Compere for the evening was local historian and personality Dean Powell.
Saturday 15th May
A Family Fun Day was held at The Ilan Centre, Rhydyfelin
from 11am, opened by RCT Councillor Maureen Webber
Attractions included: a Children's Jazz Band
followed by The GTFM Roadshow hosted by Spike until 1pm,
Plus Glyntaff's Got Talent!
On the judging panel: Gtfm's Breakfast Becci
and
Afternoon Music Workshops
Celebrating Gtfm's 10th Anniversary in May 2009
The very first Gtfm broadcast took place from Mon 17th May to Sun 13th June 1999 on 106fm in the Rhydyfelin area. A further one-month Restricted Service Licence (RSL) broadcast in 2000 was followed by the start of full-time broadcasting over a wider area in 2002 (on 106.9fm), as part of the Radio Authority's 'Access Radio' pilot study.
The success of this experiment enabled Gtfm to become the proud holder of the first Ofcom Community Radio Licence issued in Wales, with improved coverage in the immediate Pontypridd area and surrounding parts of the County Borough from summer 2007 on 107.9fm. Gtfm can also be heard everywhere on-line via this website, courtesy of the University of Glamorgan. You can find out more about the station in 'About Gtfm'
(Gt) FM & AM pioneers meet for a chat....
Pontypridd AM and Environment Minister Jane Davidson met Gtfm's original Station Manager Andrew Jones at the station for a chat about the parallel development of the Welsh Assembly and Gtfm, which began their pioneering lives within days of each other. The resulting thirty-five minute discussion was broadcast on Sunday 14th June at the start of a two-hour sequence featuring other memories from Gtfm pioneers and extracts from the original RSL broadcasts, kindly supplied by Andrew. (Allowing plenty of time for it to download and play because its a very big file )- Click to hear an mp3 recording of the programme.