‘More than an industrial boon’: Press coverage of Trawsfynydd power station’s construction, 1955-1965

Nuclear power generation has grown as an area of historical interest in recent years. While technological development has often interested historians of science, the impact of power stations on the natural landscape in specific localities has received insufficient attention. Much historical writing has neglected how the construction of nuclear power stations impacted the lives, routines, and prospects of local people upon rural north-west Wales. Both Trawsfynydd and Wylfa, the two stations constructed in the region, shaped employment opportunities and demography of the counties of Merionethshire and Anglesey (now Gwynedd and Ynŷs Mon). Recent coverage of nuclear power has been predominantly national in scope. It receives limited mentions in the major, modern Welsh history texts. Even fewer localised studies exist, particularly regarding north Wales. Primarily, they are present in political history studies of the area and are seen as attempts to reinvigorate a local economy impacted by the decline of traditional industries (slate, agriculture etc.), and this was deemed a failure. Rather, most published and unpublished research on north Wales and nuclear power has placed it either a national, political framework or a localised, high political context, in which atomic generation is a peripheral topic of discussion. Yet local parliamentarians were focused on the process of securing nuclear power stations to alleviate pressures catalysed by economic, social and cultural change. What is missing from existing studies is a broader understanding of how and why the power stations were constructed in their locations, the processes which created them and their impact on the local environment.