Royal Welsh Show celebrated in Cardiff for the first time in 70 years

  • Report by ITV Wales Rural Affairs Correspondent, Hannah Thomas

The Royal Welsh Show has been officially launched in the Senedd, the first time in its history.

It hasn't had a presence in the capital since Cardiff held the first four-day event seventy years ago.

In that year, the UK crowned it's new Queen and now 70 years on, King Charles has had his own Coronation.

Glamorgan is the host county for 2023, as it was eight decades ago. In those days the Show travelled around Wales, rather than being held on its now permanent site in Llanelwedd.

The Royal Welsh Show is the pinnacle event in the agricultural calendar Credit: PA

Welsh pony breeder David Davies' grandfather won the pony and cob championship at the 1953 show when it was held on Pontcanna Fields. In those days the show travelled north and south alternatively every year, he said:

"Having it in Cardiff in 1953, the Queen's Coronation year, was special, was very important for the show. It's lovely to mark that now in 2023, with another Coronation and the launch in Cardiff.

"If you imagine one-hundred-and-twenty years ago everything in Wales relied either on the pony or a cob. The butcher, the baker all the deliveries, the coal mines the farmers, they all had an interest. That is a very rich history, which other countries do not have.

"In 1953, all the animals would come to Cardiff on the trains, then walk to the show ground and then go back to their farms, on the trains. It was a real eye opener for the people around Cardiff Castle, to see these animals walking up and down the street."

A reserve card from the 1953 Royal Welsh Show in Cardiff

Dinarth What Ho! was the star of the 1953 show, David still has his prize cards and said:

"When he (Dinarth What Ho!) won the driving class in 1953, it was the seventh time he won that class. Then he went on to the Tom and Sprightly competition, which in those days was judged on popular applause and he won that."

The best of Welsh produce will be on display with over a thousand stands

He added: "In those days in every show, you'd have a crowd of three of four deep around the show ground.

"When he died advertisements were carried in every local papers in Wales announcing his death. In his lifetime he won over two-hundred cups."

The Royal Welsh Show provides a prime shop window for farming in Wales.

It attracts more than 200,000 visitors, up to 7,000 entries of livestock and over 1,000 trade stands ranging from crafts to Welsh produce.

This year's event will take pace between Monday the 24th of July- Thursday 27th of July with four-days of livestock and equine competitions.

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