There is little doubt that Tom Mathias was a man who gained great fulfilment in the natural beauty that surrounded his home in north Pembrokeshire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Born in Pontyrhydyceirt, near Cilgerran, in 1866, his affinity with the natural world inspired him to record his findings on camera. His images, the vast majority of which survive to the present day, bear testimony to his undoubted skill as a self-taught photographer.
Following the sudden death of his father, the master mariner who was lost at sea on the ‘Resolven, Tom became the head of the household at the age of 18, when he found work as an insurance agent in Cardigan.
But by 1895 he had embarked on a career as a professional photographer.
Tom never had a formal studio; all of his photographs were taken outdoors, often in studio-like setups and mostly within a file-mile radius of his home in Pontrhydyceirt.
Much of his photography revolved around the local gentry and their staff. Indeed, this is how Mathias met his wife, Louise Paquier, who was the French governess for the Gower family who lived in Castle Malgwyn.
Tom had an avid interest in the world around him. He developed a variety of apple that would keep better over the winter and, unusual for this period, owned a telescope and was an amateur astronomer. He was also a beekeeper and served as deacon of Llwynadda Chapel in Llechryd, for many years.
Following his death in 1940 all of Mathias’ negatives were dumped in an outhouse, where they lay, forgotten, for more than thirty years.
They were eventually discovered by local photographer James Maxwell (Maxi) Davis, in the 1970s.
The glass negatives were in a very poor condition; many were broken and damaged beyond repair while most of the reminder were very badly degraded, meaning a slow and painstaking process to print what images could be saved. But enough had survived for Maxi to appreciate the importance of what he had found, and subsequently set about the task of conserving and restoring the photographs.
It is thanks to these efforts that Tom Mathias's remarkable photographs have been saved for posterity and are available at the Amgueddfa Cymru.
Tomorrow (Sunday, May 21) photographers and historians alike will have a rare opportunity to find out more about this remarkable man in a talk that will be given at Theatr Mwldan, commencing at 2pm.
The talk will be presented by local historian Emyr Phillips while will be joined by Mathias’ great granddaughter, Andrea Sutcliffe.
For more information, visit https://mwldan.co.uk/whatson/live-tm-tm-byw/tom-mathias
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