As a rather Old Boy, I esteem it a great privilege to have been invited to make a contribution in celebration of the seventy-fifth anniversary of the school, an occasion which gives me an opportunity of greeting all Past and Present students, and in particular those Old Boys and Old Girls of my time, and before, who have survived the passing of the years, and many of whom still reside in the Aberdare and Mountain Ash areas.

I mention the latter area because during my time there was no Intermediate School in Mountain Ash, but a merry band of boys and girls used to travel daily to Aberdare on the old Taff Vale Railway.

In 1904 the school was small, resulting in small forms of boys and girls, under the Headmastership of the first Head, Mr. W. Jenkyn Thomas; the following year Mr. W.R. Cox succeeded Mr Thomas, and the former remained at the school until his retirement in 1937. We older Past Students like to think of some of the old Masters who also remained at the school for the whole of their teaching lives, - Messrs. W.R. Williams, Louis M. Thomas, A.W. Elliot, Aubrey Roberts, Ogwen Williams and Timothy Davies. Happy memories there are, too, of the Mistresses on the Staff, - Miss White, Miss Rowlands, Miss Griffiths and Miss. Morris.

The social life of the school is not to be compared with the development of later years. The boys played 'soccer' and the girls 'hockey'. We indulged in poetry readings and in the performance (not public) of scenes from some of the plays of Shakespeare. The 'pièce de résistance' was the presentation of the short farce "Box and Cox" by members of the staff, led by the late Mr. W.R. Williams.

The little school achieved its fair share of Academic Honours - it produced a Fellow of the Royal Society, Honours Graduates of the University, and throughout the years, right up to the present, these early beginnings have been followed by a line of successes unique, long and varied.

Aberdare may look with pride on the achievements of the boys and girls of the school. Old Boys and Old Girls are found in every department of public service, in the highest professions, in commerce and in industry; and not in the annals of proclaimed success are the hundreds of men and women following their daily callings, in home, office, factory, workshop, all essential to our daily life.

It is with sorrow and grateful remembrance that we think of the sacrifices of old pupils in the wars. Boys of the 1904 -1909 period gave their lives in World War I, and many more in World War II. May the host of Old Boys and Old Girls of our fine school combine always in a great determination to bring peace to a world so torn with strife.

Present pupils will live long enough for further great anniversaries, and I ask myself what glorious chapter of progress and success will be unfolded twenty-five, fifty or seventy-five years hence.

Qui vivra verra