Hendy Pool on Oliver Merrington’s LIDOS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM website is here

On Monday February 21st Carmarthenshire County Council decided to undertake a full survey of the costs to fix Hendy Pool, since the estimate of £100,000 costs was made on the basis of just visual evidence.

Hendy Pool was built by unemployed tin workers in the 1930’s and has been run voluntarily by local people for the last few years???

More???.

The History

The pool was opened in 1932. Until then the local children would either go to swim in the local rivers or the marsh.  The idea of a pool came about following a local tragedy, a young boy died as  a result of an accident swimming in the river in the villageÖ the river Gwili.

A public meeting was held following his death and the parish council agreed to a pool being built.  The project gave much needed work to the army of unemployed tinplate workers  in the village and the  neighbouring district. They came along with shovels  and pick axes, and worked to divert the course of the river Gwili, cleared  the rubbish tip and proceeded to reclaim the land. As one local historian  said ” It was built by voluntary labour and people who were on the dole, and  the means test” They had no help from JCBís or such like! The men received  no remuneration for their work, but were given either a pack of Woodbine  cigarettes or a bar of chocolate a day for their efforts, and these were  supplied by local businesses..

Other local traders helped with offers of free cement and concrete and the  pool opened in 1933.

The course of the river had to be changed in two places. They had to open a trench for the water pipe which was nearly 200 yards, and a hole wich was 50 yrds long and 20 yards wide with a depth of three feet going down to six feet.  The whole project had been an enormous sacrifice and extremely hard manual work for the small, poor community of HendyÖas our village historian said, we should say thanks to “those determined men” .  Hope thatís of some use to you.

Thanks for your interest and support, as you can appreciate the pool is part of the heritage of the community and is very close to our hearts.

Lee Owen, Hendy Pool Campaigner