Museum explains story behind bronze plaque in memory of man who loved Wrexham

Originally, the plaque was erected in 1922 in the old library and was to celebrate the life and works of A.N. Palmer, not to be confused with a Mr Arnold Palmer.

As Jonathon Gammond, Interpretation and Access Officer at Wrexham Museum explains, this has happened on a number of occasions times.

He said: “He has been confused with the famous golfer, Arnold Palmer, on the more than one occasion with people asking what the connection is between the aforementioned and Wrexham.”

Alfred Neobard Palmer was born in Norfolk on July 10, 1847.

Apprenticed to a pharmacist in Bury St. Edmunds, he won the Bell Scholarship of the Pharmaceutical Society.

He was then employed as a chemist and moved around to London, then Manchester, before being appointed chemist at a mineral water works in Pentre Felin, Wrexham in 1880.

This led to him finding employment as an industrial chemist at Brymbo Steel Works and then he later spent 13 years as an analytical chemist at the Cambrian Leather Works.

But why he has been honoured in bronze isn’t down to his chemistry work, it’s his historical knowledge and love of Wrexham that has left a lasting legacy.

He scribed 10 books in total, the first of which was ‘The town, fields and folk of Wrexham in the time of James the First.’

In 1892 Alfred Palmer started his campaign for Wrexham to have its own museum.

He wrote to the Free Library Committee to ask them to place a display case in the library as the first step to establishing a museum.

Eight years later he was still lobbying the librarians and it took another 80 years for Wrexham to consider having a museum, more than another decade to find a building, then finally in 1996, 104 years after Alfred launched his campaign, Wrexham Museum opened on Regent Street.

All this information was taken from books and articles in the Wrexham Museum archives search room which you access by visiting http://www.wrexham.gov.uk/english/heritage/archives/index.htm.