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Abertillery Birth Control Clinics.
On Monday 15th of June 1925, a “People’s Clinic” for Birth Control and Social Welfare was opened at the Abertillery and District Hospital, Aberbeeg. The advertisements stated that advice would be given free of charge to married women by a qualified nurse between the hours of 10.00am and 12.30pm. For any information concerning the clinic, enquiries should be addressed to the clinic nurse at the hospital.
In September 1925 a Birth Control & Social Welfare Clinic opened at 14 Granville Street, Abertillery (as seen below). The advertisement stated that at the above address married women were advised by lady specialists as to the best methods of birth control – Consultation and Advice was at a cost of 1/ Shilling.
On Sunday 8th of November 1925, Dr Marie Stopes held a grand lecture on “The Facts and Ideals of Birth Control” at the Gymnasium Hall, Abertillery. The lecture was held under the auspices of the Abertillery Constructive Birth Control Committee of which the chairman was Mr W. Beynon, the hon secretaries were Messrs David Daggar and Ivor Griffiths. Mr Davis Daggar presided. Also on the platform were Dr Marie Stopes, nurse Jones (from the Abertillery Birth Control Clinic), Councillor E. Leach and Mr Griffiths.
Dr Stopes was the greatest exponent of Constructive Birth Control in the world, she believed she could not have selected a more appropriate place than Abertillery to have sown the seeds of her theory. Dr Stopes and her husband opened the first birth control clinic at Holloway, North London in 1921 but the Abertillery and District Hospital Committee, Aberbeeg were entitled to the credit for having opened the first official hospital clinic in the country.
Marie Stopes 1880-1958.
Marie Carmichael Stopes was born in Scotland, she was a British palaeobotanist, author and campaigner for birth control. She was educated at the University of London and graduated with honours in botany and geology and also studied in Munich where she got a P.H.D. in palaeobotany.
Marie Stopes first husband was the Canadian botanist Mr Reginald Ruggles Gates, she later married the British businessman Mr Humphrey Verdon Roe, a philanthropist and aircraft manufacture who became her financial backer for most of her famous work.
In 1910 Mr Humphrey Verdon Roe along with his elder brother Mr Edwin Alliott Verdon Roe who was a pioneer British pilot, founded the A. V. Roe & Co (AVRO) Aviation Company.