This film is part of Free

Southgate Tollhouse, Aberystwyth and Aberarth

The keeper of the Southgate Tollhouse, at the confluence of 5 roads, once extracted a much-hated tax from humble road users, but the building later became just an unusual home.

Home movie 1961 6 mins Silent

From the collection of:

Logo for National Screen and Sound Archive of Wales

Overview

Southgate Tollhouse, Penparcau – on the outskirts of Aberystwyth - sat at a confluence of five roads, so offering rich pickings for the local gentry who caused it to be built in 1771. It was inhabited until it was moved, piece by careful piece, to St Fagans National History Museum in Cardiff in 1962, where it has been rebuilt. Once hated constructions, tollhouses were mostly abolished by the 1860s, with county councils shouldering the responsibility for road maintenance.