Family memories with Fay Hampson...

I love these photographs of my grandparents, Herbert and Mary Hampson, taken when grandad was the Mayor of Wrexham in 1933/4.

The photographs are hand-coloured monochrome prints. The golden age of hand-colouring was between 1900 and 1940, and I feel lucky that these portraits were taken in 1933/4 just before the advent in 1935 of Kodachrome colour processing, which surely would not have resulted in such subtle, delicate colour.

The notable event of grandad's mayoral year was the terrible Gresford Colliery disaster, about which I have already written. He never forgot the events of that awful night.

St David's Day 1956 was a sad day for Wrexham as the Mayor, William Shone, died in office. Grandad was deputy Mayor at the time and after more than 20 years he found himself once more wearing the mayoral robes.

At a special meeting of Wrexham Town Council held on October 9, 1957, grandad was made an Honorary Freeman of the Borough of Wrexham in recognition of his services to the town.

We were all, especially grandma, very proud of this modest, hard-working, down-to-earth man.