In 1948 a young man from Rhosllanerchrugog, who was at the time reading chemistry at Bangor University, decided that on taking his degree he would ‘go in for mining’, which meant that instead of simply working in the pit he would also study to become a manager. There were by this time six collieries still operating in North Wales, and the obvious one for him to enter as a beginner would have been Hafod, the village pit at the foot of the hill, where his father, starting work at the age of 13, had risen to be underground manager; but the young man wanted to go where he would not be known and applied to Gresford Colliery, which by then employed 1,600 men. Even Gresford had some associations for him because his father, as captain of a rescue team, had been the first man to set foot on the pit bottom when exploration of the gas-filled area was begun in 1935.

As a newcomer he spent six months on a training face.