In the centre of Blaenau Ffestiniog is a river of slate – a paving motif in multi-coloured slates. The names of over 350 slate quarries from across Wales are engraved on the colour of slate appropriate to each quarry. The sea of names is a reminder of the past magnitude of this industry and the men who worked in each quarry. The river is an appropriate image: slate is mostly river mud washed into ancient oceans hundreds of millions of years ago. And before the Ffestiniog Railway was built in the 1830’s, slate was carried on small boats down the river below Ffestiniog and out to ships at Porthmadog.
On each side of the slate river Howard commissioned Blaenau-born poet, the late Gwyn Thomas to create bi-lingual text. Aware of the harsh conditions of the slate industry, in Welsh he wrote ‘Llifa amser yn ei flaen a llifa dŵr; ni lifa bywyd creigiwr.’ (Time flows forward and water flows; not the life of a rockman). In English he reflected ‘Men die; the rocks in the empty darkness of these mountains endure.’