David Wills Photographs - RISCA
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Planned Environment Therapy Trust Archive and Study Centre
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Press Release 25 July 2007
Rare Risca Photographs Go Online
Click here to go straight to the Album
Volunteer archives trainee Sharon Boyle has revealed 144 previously unseen photographs from the private photograph albums of the late David Wills. Taken in and around the South Wales town of Risca in the early 1930s, the photographs show people, places and events most of which are unidentified. We are hoping people in and from the Western Valley of Monmouthshire can help identify them.
Swansea-born Wills is best known nationally and internationally for his pioneering work with delinquent and disturbed children and young people, for which he was awarded an OBE in 1974. He wrote a number of books about his experiences, including The Hawkspur Experiment in 1940, The Barns Experiment in 1945, and Throw Away Thy Rod in 1960. Until now, however, his work in Risca has remained virtually unknown.
David Wills and his wife Ruth were appointed wardens of the Oxford House Educational Settlement at Risca in 1931.
The educational settlement which flourished in Risca from the early 1930s onwards had its roots in an appeal made by the Lord Mayor of London a few years previously to help those impoverished by unemployment. The Mayor of Oxford's Mining Distress Committee was formed, and public utility works were organised and relief of other kinds was given to the people of coal mining areas, including Risca in Monmouthshire. A grant made by the Educational Settlement Association to the Oxford Committee helped this work to continue.
David Wills, the first British psychiatric social worker to train in the USA, was charged in 1931 with establishing a centre where adult education could be provided, and the tedium of 'idleness' thus be alleviated. The Unemployed Men's Club was given free use of shop premises and bought woodwork and shoe repair tools which they used to make repairs. They were given instruction in a number of crafts and had the opportunity to attend a series of lectures. Other activities, such as clubs for girls and boys and dramatic and musical societies were also set up, and holidays and camping trips were planned.
David and Ruth left in 1935 to embark on the pioneering work with children and young people for which they are best remembered. By then there was a full time boys and girls club, a dramatic society, a woman's adult school, and in addition to the men's unemployed club in Risca there were similar clubs in other parts of the valley.
Along with David and Ruth Wills, the photographs in the album show a variety of activities that the people of Risca and the Western Valley of Monmouthshire engaged in. There is camping, dramatics, and other groups and individuals, most of whom are unidentified. Volunteer Sharon Boyle has created a web-site with all of the Risca photographs from David Wills' album in the hope that some readers or visitors to the web-site may be able to identify themselves or their relatives in them, and perhaps even tell us where and what the photographs are about. There is an online form with each photograph which people with information or questions can fill in.
To see the whole album in thumbnails, go to http://www.pettrust.org.uk and click on "RISCA".
Sharon's Pick
To see Sharon's seven favourite photographs, CLICK HERE.
Additional information
David Wills
William David Wills was born on December 11, 1903, to Charles Alfred and Susan Emily Wills, who were living at 5 Richards Terrace in Swansea. He died in 1980.
David Wills was the author of a number of books about his pioneering work with children and young people. The Hawkspur Experiment, first published in 1940, concerned a therapeutic camp for disturbed and delinquent young men in rural Essex, where he was the Camp Chief from 1936 to 1940. The Barns Experiment, published in 1945, told the story of Barns House hostel and school for unbilletable boys run by the Edinburgh Society of Friends (Quakers) in Scotland, of which David Wills was Warden from 1940 to 1945. Throw Away Thy Rod, published in 1960, was about his experience as founding head from 1949 to 1961 of Bodenham Manor School for maladjusted children in Herefordshire. He also wrote Spare the Child, published by Penguin in 1971, about the transformation of the Cotswold Approved School into therapeutic community called The Cotswold Community.
Sharon Boyle
This online album has been put together by Sharon Boyle. Sharon is currently a teacher of English as a Foreign Language living and working in Hong Kong, having previously taught in Poland and Japan. Excited by archives, she is currently gaining practical experience before applying to train as an archivist on an archives course in Britain. After leaving the Planned Environment Therapy Trust Archive and Study Centre in Gloucestershire she will be spending time at the British Telecom archives in London, and will then go to the Derry Record Office in Northern Ireland.
The Planned Environment Therapy Trust
The Planned Environment Therapy Trust, Registered Charity No. 248633, was founded in 1966 to promote effective treatment for children and adults with emotional and psychological disorders. It encourages research, discussion and training in a variety of therapeutic approaches, particularly those known as “therapeutic communities”, and manages a small residential and conference centre at its base in rural Gloucestershire.
The Archive and Study Centre
This unique resource was established in 1989 to gather, care for, and make available in a professional and appropriate way archive, library and other materials related to planned environment therapy, therapeutic community, milieu therapy, and progressive/alternative/democratic education more generally. It currently holds over 200 unique archive collections, with over 7,000 volumes in its Research Library, and over 2,000 films and recordings in its oral history and audio-video collections. The main Archive and Study Centre web-site is at http://www.pettarchiv.org.uk.
The Archive and Study Centre is open daily by appointment from 9 to 3. For further information contact the Archivist, Dr. Craig Fees, on 01242 620125, craig@pettarchiv.org.uk, or by using the online Archive Contact Form.
Additional Source of Information on Oxford House Educational Settlement, Risca
Gwent Record Office holds extensive records relating to the Educational Settlement at Risca, including minutes (1932-35), minutes of corresponding organisations (1930-1971), financial records (1934-66), correspondence and reports (1931-72) and newspaper cuttings(1931-59).
You can find out more information about this by following this link to the Archives Network Wales website: Archives Network Wales
Correction to Archives Network Wales Entry
The Archives Network Wales states that David and Ruth Wills were both graduates of Oxford University. This isn't the case. Both were experienced practitioners rather than graduates. Having been a brother at Wallingford Farm Training Colony and acquired considerable experience elsewhere, David Wills studied at the University of Birmingham from 1927-29 for a Diploma in Social Studies, and was then awarded the William Straight Fellowship at the New York School of Social Work at Columbia University, where he did his psychiatric social work training from 1929 to 1930. He was the first British man to do this psychiatric social work training.
Contributors to this Project
Sharon Boyle, Craig Fees and James Powell, who scanned many of the images when he was a Volunteer. Sharon and James both came to the Archive and Study Centre by way of the Society of Archivist's online work experience placements lists (Click here).
For more information on Volunteers and Volunteering at the Archive and Study Centre, Click here.
