Bro FFestiniog Rugby Club is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.

There will be a reunion at the club on Bank Holiday Sunday, 27 August for former players, members of the committee and supporters.

The event will be from midday onwards with an opportunity to socialize before the start of the formal reunion at 3pm.

Old photographs are being collected to produce a powerpoint presentation and there will be a comprehensive booklet providing a bit of the club’s history.

The club was formed officially in 1973 after about 15 local boys went to play a rugby game against Bay Colwyn III at the college fields in Rhos on Sea on Easter Monday 1972.

The ‘team’ was made up of sixth form boys at Ysgol Y Moelwyn, one or two who had played before and the rest just interested in giving rugby a go.

Despite losing 32-3, interest in rugby picked up with some of the boys going on to play for Harlech and a new club in Penrhyn, which broke up after a short while.

As a consequence, it was decided to raise a team in the Blaenau Ffestiniog area to play some of the games that Penrhyn had organised.

They went on to form a club in Blaenau in 1973 using the dark shirts and a ball or two on loan from Penrhyn.

A ‘press gang’ had to be raised on Saturdays to go around the town’s pubs to ‘persuade’ some boys to play and seven games were played in total.

Gwynne Williams, now a club 50th reunion 50 committee member, and Gwyn Evans Plisman searched the town for a field to host games but no site was available and all the matches had to be played away for a season.

At the first meeting it was decided to name the club ‘Clwb Rygbi Blaenau Dolwyddelan’.

Ysgol y Moelwyn teachers Alun Jones and Merfyn C Williams helped form a committee which included Gwynne Williams as chairman, Trefor Wood as secretary and Glyn Eden Jones as treasurer.

Mr Jones arranged to have vice presidents for the club and county councillor RH Roberts as president.

Generous donations were received by business people in the town, especially Magi Jen y Meirion, and a successful Grand National raffle was organized to buy new shirts and balls.