As the first University College in Wales, Aberystwyth has a long and distinguished tradition of teaching and research, and our establishment in the 19th century is one of the great stories of pioneering achievement in modern Welsh history.
Led by London Welshman Hugh Owen, a small group of patriots sought from the 1850s onwards to raise enough money by public and private subscription to establish a college of university status in Wales.
The first decade presented many challenges for the University’s survival. The generosity of a few individual benefactors and organised appeals for support from the ordinary people of Wales kept the University in being, and, perhaps more importantly, deeply rooted it in the minds and the affection of the Welsh people.
As the first University College in Wales, Aberystwyth has a long and distinguished tradition of teaching and research, and our establishment in the 19th century is one of the great stories of pioneering achievement in modern Welsh history.
Led by London Welshman Hugh Owen, a small group of patriots sought from the 1850s onwards to raise enough money by public and private subscription to establish a college of university status in Wales. A project of enormous ambition, the University opened its doors in 1872 initially with a handful of teachers and just 25 students in what was then a half-finished hotel building (‘the Old College’) on the seafront.
