Sennybridge

Sennybridge (Welsh: Pontsenni) is a village in Powys, Wales, in the historic county of Brecknockshire, situated some 42 miles (68 km) from Cardiff and 31 miles (50 km) from Swansea. It lies 9 miles (14 km) west of Brecon on the A40 trunk road to Llandovery, at the point where the Afon Senni flows into the Usk. It is in the community of Maescar.

One factor that influenced the growth of Sennybridge was the Neath and Brecon Railway, which opened a station in the adjoining village of Defynnog in 1867.^[1] The promoter and contractor of the railway, John Dickson, also made a start on constructing a railway north from Sennybridge that would have linked the Neath and Brecon Railway to the Central Wales Line at Llangammarch Wells but work was suspended on his bankruptcy in 1867 and never resumed. The partially completed earthworks can still be seen in the countryside north of Sennybridge.

In an earlier era, in about 1821 the Brecon Forest Tramroad started construction. The northern terminus of the route from the Swansea Valley (via Crai) was at Castell-Du Farm at Sennybridge. The tramroad, operated by horse-drawn wagons, came down to a loading platform adjacent to the modern A40 road at the west end of the village. The modern alignment of the A40 road was only made possible (as a turnpike road) when the bridge across the Senni was built. Prior to this, the road west to Llandovery went down to the River Usk and crossed it by the ford at Rhyd y Briw, which must have been subject to the state of the river! The ramp down to the ford and the line of the ford across the Usk is still visible. The earthworks for the tramroad can be seen on the west side of the road from Defynnog to Crai, although care is needed in the interpretation as some of the earthworks were re-used for the later Neath and Brecon Railway.

Una extensa área de terreno al norte de Sennybridge es utilizada por el Ministerio de Defensa para fines de entrenamiento militar. El Campamento de Sennybridge y el Centro de Entrenamiento de Campo del Ejército , conocido como SENTA, es una de las principales bases para el entrenamiento de infantería del Ejército Británico en el Reino Unido.

La escuela primaria de Sennybridge, que alberga una unidad de lengua galesa , utiliza los antiguos edificios de la escuela secundaria moderna del pueblo. Aunque la escuela está en Sennybridge, siguió llamándose Escuela Primaria Defynnog hasta la década de 1980, cuando cambió su nombre a Escuela Primaria Sennybridge.

• William Rees-Thomas CB FRCP FRSM (1887–1978), un psiquiatra galés, nació en Senny.
• Tom Rees , nacido en 1895 en Cefnbrynich, cerca de la ciudad, fue la primera víctima oficial del "Barón Rojo": el as de la aviación alemán Manfred von Richthofen .
• Rhydian Roberts (nacido en 1983), cantante barítono, presentador de televisión y actor de teatro musical; quedó segundo en The X Factor (serie británica 4) . ^{[ 4 ]}
• Margaret Clifford tenía su criadero de Fox Terrier de pelo liso en Castle Road, Sennybridge. Desde allí, ganó el premio al Mejor de la Raza en Crufts 2007 ( resultados ) con su perro Migley Sirrah Jack. Un cartel publicitario del periódico local (el Brecon and Radnor Express) en la gasolinera Texaco de Sennybridge decía: "Senny Pooch es el mejor perro"..

• Guía web de la BBC Mid Wales sobre Sennybridge.
• Fotos de Sennybridge y sus alrededores en geograph.org.uk