Sir Henry Jones

Like most other children in the late 19th Century, Henry Jones left school at 12 and went to work. But unlike others, Henry was encouraged to study. Working with his father, the village shoemaker during the day and, ‘working at my books... throughout the small hours and till morning came,’ he won a scholarship to train as a teacher.

Continuing his studies, he eventually became Professor of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow University. Henry was a brilliant philosopher and teacher, whose work was greatly influenced by the shoemaker’s workshop and life in his home village. He never forgot his humble origins and worked hard to improve the system of education in Wales. In 1912 he was knighted and in 1922 made a Companion of Honour.

He also received the medal of the Cymmrodorion Society for his services to Wales. Following Henry’s death in 1922 a memorial fund was established and in 1934 his childhood home, Y Cwm, was opened as a museum. You can still visit the shoemaker’s workshop and the tiny kitchen and bedroom where Henry and his family worked and lived. But you can also find out more about the chapel, the school and life in ‘a remote upland village – the sort of home from which most that is best in Wales has sprung.’ It’s worth a visit.