The identities of two Welsh families picked to take part in BBC Cymru Wales’ spectacular new series set in Snowdonia 1890 can be revealed today (Thursday, October 7).
The Jones family from Denbigh and the Braddocks from Abergavenny are the lucky families chosen to enter Snowdonia 1890, a Victorian world without electricity or their usual home comforts – where the men have to tackle back-breaking work at the local quarry while the women run the house, and the families work the land and run a smallholding to put food on the table.
Filmed mainly in Rhosgadfan on the slopes of Snowdonia, as well as other locations around the area, the landmark series, which starts on BBC One Wales on October 18, sees the two specially selected families embark on an epic journey as they commit to living as closely as they can to the 1890 way of life.
With a huge range of ages – Heulwen, from the Jones family is 75, while the youngest farmhouse entrants are her grandson Jac and the Braddock’s daughter Leah, both 9 – the challenges the individuals will face are many and varied.
Jac’s sister Ela, 11, joins him in thinking there will be “nothing to do” without a computer, while Ela faces other issues as a vegetarian in a world where meat from a family’s own animals was the staple food.
Their parents David, a partner in a law firm, and Catrin, a tribunals officer, and big brother Ben, 18, make up the rest of the Jones family.
The Braddocks are couple Mark and Alisa, and children Jamie, 19, Jordan, 16, Tommy, 13 and Leah.
Before entering the farmhouses which will be their homes for almost four weeks, the families were realistic about the hardships they could face – but looking forward to seeing how they would cope as a family, said Catrin. And Alisa agreed. “I thought it would be good to be out in a house where you’ve got no mod cons… really get back to basics and bond as a family,” she says.
The manual labour was on the minds of Ben and his dad David. “I’m looking forward to some graft… I get in the car, go to school, stay in school and come home,” says Ben. “I’ll have to be a lot more independent and think for myself.” David is looking forward to “going back to a way of life that we never get the chance to understand,” while admitting the manual labour would be “a shock to the system”.
And Mark, a medical technician, was realistic about the hardship of the days he was about to face. “If we don’t have enough slate or make enough tiles, we don’t get paid; so of course then if you don’t get paid, you haven’t got money to buy food for the family, so there’s a different kind of pressure. Back then they had that worry – if they didn’t work, they didn’t eat!”
The families will be helped along by a host of local north Wales individuals, such as the butcher, the preacher and the teacher, who appear as 1890 versions of themselves.
The series, created by Indus Television, the makers of the hit series Coal House, starts on Monday, October 18, on BBC One Wales and continues every Monday, Wednesday and Friday evening for three weeks.
Judith Winnan, Commissioning Executive for BBC Cymru Wales, says, “Series such as Snowdonia 1890 are a fantastic insight into our past but they rely entirely on the people who take part to make that journey enjoyable and revealing. Both the Braddock and Jones families signed up fully to the experience of living the life of a 19th century Snowdonia smallholder and throughout the filming, they gave it their all. It’s thanks to them that we’ve got such a fantastic series that sheds real light on that period.”
