'People Might Not Use a Kiosk From This Year to the Next, but One Day It Could Be a Real Lifeline' ; Over More Than 80 Years They Have Gained Such a Place in the Nostalgic Heart of Britain That Many of Them Are Now Listed Buildings. Some Have Literally Been Lifesavers. But the Humble Phone Box Could Soon Become a Thing of the Past in Many Parts of Wales, As Steffan Rhys Reports

Western Mail › June 25, 2008

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Summary

FOR six months, not a single pint was pulled at the Tafarn Bach pub. Because one night in autumn 2004, while locals drank real ale in the bar and the landlady's four youngest children settled down upstairs, a fire tore through the isolated country pub, the result of an electrical fault in its attic.

The first Julia Davies and her husband, Dorian, knew of it was when her youngest son, Ifan-John, then aged four, came running into the pub to alert them to the smoke.

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Extract

'People Might Not Use a Kiosk From This Year to the Next, but One Day It Could Be a Real Lifeline' ; Over More Than 80 Years They Have Gained Such a Place in the Nostalgic Heart of Britain That Many of Them Are Now Listed Buildings. Some Have Literally Been Lifesavers. But the Humble Phone Box Could Soon Become a Thing of the Past in Many Parts of Wales, As Steffan Rhys Reports

As customers and staff fled out into the night, his older sister Nia, then 17, ran to a telephone kiosk 20 yards down the road to summon help.

The thick black smoke that quickly spread through the pub and the family's home meant reaching their own telephone had quickly become impossible.

Mrs Davies, now a mother of six, believes that it was the presence of this kiosk that allowed the pub to open again after its six-month enforced closure.

With Tafarn Bach two ...

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