Ferndale is a village located in the Rhondda Valley in the area district of Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales. Neighbouring villages are Blaenllechau, Maerdy and Tylorstown. Ferndale was industrialised in the mid-19th century. The first coal mine shaft was sunk in 1857 as well as was the first area to be intensively industrialised in the Rhondda Valley. In Welsh, Ferndale is known as Glynrhedynog, the name of one of the old farms on which the town is built. In its infancy Glynrhedynog was additionally known as Trerhondda after the name of the first large chapel to be built in the community. The naming of settlements after churches prevailed in Wales at the time, as is shown in village names such as Bethesda, Beulah as well as Horeb, however neither Glynrhedynog neither Trerhondda was destined to be made use of for long. Glynrhedynog is made from words "glyn" indicating valley and also "rhedynog" meaning ferny, and so coal from the Glynrhedynog pits was marketed as Ferndale coal, a much easier name for English customers to take in. The Ferndale pits are what attracted the workforce and also their households to the area, as well as by the 1880s "Ferndale" was well developed as a growing town. With the phasing in of multilingual roadway signs from the late 1980s onwards, the name Glynrhedynog progressively came back as well as is now the officially marked Welsh language name for Ferndale. The Welsh language is on the boost in Ferndale after the town adopted the English language throughout the Industrial transformation. A Welsh language college is positioned near the park as well as the college is called after the park's lake, 'Llyn-y-Forwyn.' (The Maiden's Lake).
