For more than half a century the modest clock has been respectfully protected – wrapped in dusters – by the family of the man who pulled it out of the rubble on that terrible day.
Now the Aberfan school clock, which stopped at 9.13am on 21 October 1966, the precise time an avalanche of coal waste crashed into classrooms and homes, claiming the lives of 116 children and 28 adults, is to go on display at a Welsh museum.
Mike Flynn, whose father was one of the rescuers who rushed to Pantglas junior school, handed the clock over to the permanent collection of Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales on Thursday.
The clock will be put on display in the “Wales Is” gallery at St Fagans National Museum of History in Cardiff from 16 February, a permanent, tangible reminder of one of the most tragic days in Welsh history.
Flynn described how his late father, also Mike Flynn, a postal worker and a paramedic in the Territorial Army, was among those who went to help as news began to emerge that slurry, coal waste and tailings had poured from the hillside into the village.
He said: “My father travelled up from Cardiff to Aberfan. I was only seven but remember the day vividly. I got back from school and both the front and back door was open. My father was supposed to be there but was absent. Then the disaster was all over the news. It was quiet, eerie.”
Flynn Sr plucked the clock from the rubble and handed it over to the police. After the inquiry into the disaster, the clock was returned to the family, and it has emerged only once in public since then, for the 50th anniversary of the tragedy in 2016.
Like many victims, families and rescuers, Flynn Sr was deeply upset by what he saw that day. “He didn’t talk about it but he was profoundly affected,” his son said. Flynn Sr decided to do what he could for his own community, including taking residents of children’s homes out on trips.
He kept the clock in the box it had come back in from the inquiry, and after he died it was passed to his son for safekeeping. “We kept it wrapped in dusters and clingfilm,” Flynn said.
Flynn, 61, a technical director for an electrical company, is delighted that the museum is taking the clock in. “It is the most appropriate place for it. The clock is a very poignant reminder of what happened. It seems to encapsulate that moment in time. It’s an emotive piece. My family has been the custodians of the clock for 55 years but we always felt it was owned by Aberfan and the Welsh community.”
Sioned Williams, the principal curator of modern history at St Fagans, said: “We’re very grateful to Mike for donating the clock. It means a great deal. There aren’t many objects that survive to tell the story of the Aberfan disaster. It’s an opportunity for us to tell a very important story. We hope to collect many more items linked to the disaster.”
The clock may be an historical artefact but the issue of coal tips has not gone away. The Labour-led Welsh government continues to call on Boris Johnson’s UK administration to allocate long-term funding for the tips that still threaten communities across Wales.
The Welsh government argues that extreme weather caused by the climate crisis is making many of the tips unstable and believes at least £500m to £600m will be needed over the next 10 to 15 years to make them safe.
Only this week there were heated exchanges in the Welsh parliament, with the Tories saying the Labour government had to pay for the tips to be made safe, and the Welsh first minister, Mark Drakeford, insisting the UK government had to help.
Lee Waters, the Welsh deputy minister for climate change, said: “The issue is a live one. We really worry that history will repeat itself if we don’t make these tips safe. We’ve got 40% of the UK’s coal tips in Wales. This is not something that has happened since we’ve had devolved powers. It’s a legacy of Britain’s industrial past and Britain has a responsibility to put it right, not just Wales.”
