Still a thriving shopping community as can be seen on a busy Saturday afternoon looking down the High Street toward Pontllanfraith.
Blackwood grew as a town from a handful of cottages and a scattering of remote farms.
The development of the Iron industry at the 'Head' of the valley and elsewhere, sparked off a huge demand for coal and soon the Blackwood area was dotted with many pits, levels and collieries.
It was also an important 'stopping off' point on the Sirhowy Tramroad, for it was here that the tramroad horses were rested and watered, another factor which contributed to Blackwood's growth.
Blackwood was also fortunate in having John Hodder Moggridge as the main employer and land-owner in early days.
Moggridge was one of the more enlightened and benevolent employers of the time and his 'Social Experiment' whereby workers were able to lease land from him to build their own dwellings was also a major factor in the development of the area.
Blackwood's growth is on-going: Many new residential properties have been built and a major retail development has recently been completed at the north end of the town.
BLACKWOOD is a large village, about half a mile long, in a beautiful valley, through which flows the river Sirhowy, and has a station on the Newport and Sirhowy branch of the London and North Western railway, 8 miles south from Tredegar and 7½ south-west from Pontypool: it is lighted with gas from works the property of the Blackwood Gas Co.St. Margaret's, a chapel of ease to Bedwellty, erected in 1876, is a small building of stone with Bath stone dressing in the Gothic style, consisting of chancel, nave and western turret containing one bell. The large public hall, holding 600 people, is used for public meetings and entertainments. Here is an iron foundry and two collieries.
 |
 |
