A colour photo of Aneurin Bevan in 1958 taken from the side as he is speaking in front of a microphone. He is facing towards the left of the picture. He wears a dark grey pinstripe suit, white shirt and grey striped tie. His white hair is parted on the left side and is thick. Behind him three people can be seen sitting in a row, looking at him speaking.
The debating club that helped shape NHS architect Aneurin Bevan's drive for power
In the winter of 1921, a group of men gathered in a café in a small working class town.
Almost all were colliers used to the hard life hacking coal from the rich seams of the south Wales valleys - the region that had powered the industrial revolution and underpinned the growth and wealth of the global British Empire.
But few of the benefits of that wealth had trickled down to the people who produced it.
This was the launch of the Query Club, a semi-secret society that began examining socialist ideas and ended as a force which changed their town – and later, through their ideas, the whole country.
One of those young debaters was Aneurin Bevan, the man who would go on to found the NHS and revolutionise housing for ordinary people when he became minister for health and housing two decades later.
It was revealed recently that MI5 followed him from around this time for 20 years, considering Bevan a firebrand left-winger linked to prominent communists.
The Query Club members in the 1920s, with Aneurin Bevan in the back row, second from right
A black and white photograph of the Query Club members taken in the 1920s has been incorporated into an information panel. There are 20 men all dressed in suits and ties pictured in three rows. Above the photograph the words "The Query Club" are printed, and to the right some bits of words, mostly in Welsh, can be seen.
Private collieries and iron works held a grip over the working people, with owners and managers powerful in local institutions such as the town council and hospital board.
Bevan, the son of a miner, had spent time underground and was all too familiar with the lack of control ordinary people had over their working lives and living conditions.
The Query Club gradually came to realise that if they wanted to change things, they had to be where the power was.
"The Query Club was this organisation which was Bevan and his comrades asking 'how do we actually achieve change here in Tredegar? How do we try to influence things?'," said Dr Nye Davies.
"I think they decided what we need to do is be on every single committee, every single board, every single institution that has some level of influence in the community and we need to get like-minded socialists on to those boards."
Davies, a senior lecturer at Cardiff University who was written books on Bevan, believes the search for power was central to everything the Query Club wanted to achieve.
Aneurin Bevan, pictured in 1934, dedicated his political life to gaining power for ordinary people
Black and white headshot of Aneurin Bevan taken in 1934. His dark hair is parted on the side and slicked back. A suit jacket and white shirt collar are visible. He appears to be leaning out of a train carriage door and is looking slightly to the right of the photo. He has a serious expression.
One of its leading figures was Walter Conway, the only member over 30, and an orphan raised in the local workhouse.
Rather against the popular perception of neglect and brutality the name often evokes, the master of the house had taught Conway to read and write and given him a lifelong love of learning.
In 1915, Conway beat 50 other applicants to become secretary of the Tredegar Medical Aid Society.
As in other towns, workers formed the society by contributing a small payment from their wages, to cover costs when medical needs arose.
During Conway's time in charge, the society expanded from a membership of 5,000 at its start to 20,000 by the time of his death in 1933, representing 95% of the town.
Wives, children and non-miners were all admitted, changing this health service for workers into a universal one – for Tredegar, at least.
They knew all the important institutions of the town – the council, the hospital board, the workingmen's club, even the medical aid society itself – were dominated by board members who belonged to the major power in the town, the Tredegar Iron and Coal Company, with an interest in keeping power in the hands of the well-to-do.
As members of the emerging Labour party and committed socialists, they set their sights on changing that.
Nye Davies says debates among the Query Club members helped hone the oratory skills Aneurin Bevan used in Parliament
Head and shoulders shot of Nye Davie, who is a white man in his 20s or 30s. He has short light reddish-brown hair and a beard. He is looking directly at the camera and smiling. Behind him are white bookshelves
John Morgan, a local councillor and the great-nephew of one of the 20 members of the Query Club, still lives in Tredegar and has researched its history.
The Workman's Institute, where the club would eventually meet following its early days in cafes, is long gone.
But the Medical Aid Society building now houses the Tredegar Medical Aid Society Heritage Centre.
A small meeting room at the back is dedicated to the Query Club, with photographs and information preserving its memory.
"I used to go out walking with my uncle when he was in his 80s and 90s," he explained.
"He died when I was about 12 but if I knew then what I know now I'd have spent hours talking to him about the Query Club because some of the things they got up to - they were radicals."
In 1922, they put Bevan up for the town council, and by 1929, the 16 members comprised of 10 from Labour, with five of these members of the Query Club.
Tredegar town council chambers in Bedwellty House has remained in use since the Query Club's domination of it in the 1920s
The town council chamber in Bedwellty House. There are two curving rows of eight seats each, which have reddish-purple leather padded backs with a small plaque on the top of each backrest and a pew-like writing space in front. There is an aisle in between separating them into blocks with four seats on either side. To the right are stained glass obscured internal windows and a door. There is a wall-mounted projector at the back, a tall display poster turned back to front and two mounted wall lamps either side of the room. A photograph of former Labour leader Sir Neil Kinnock is on the side wall.
Through the 1920s, Query Club members and others sympathetic to their thinking gained key seats in the town's institutions.
They were, however, "very selective" on who could join the club, and be permitted to wear the club's badge with its signature question mark.
"People knew that the Query Club existed but when they would ask them 'what does the badge mean?' they would say 'oh, that's the question'," Morgan said.
"They infiltrated a lot of organisations but they would go through a series of tests and interviews before they allowed anybody to become a member."
John Morgan is a white man in his 70s. He has short white hair and a ruddy complexion. He wears a peacock blue jumper over a light blue shirt collar. He is standing to the side of the Query Club photograph and information panel.
Bevan moved on to the next level of power by being elected to the county council, in Newport.
But as Davies explains, he realised this still wasn't enough, adding: "Bevan said 'power is still eluding us, it's still elsewhere'.
"And that's what led him to go to Parliament as the ultimate place where power lay.
"That quest for power was really what drove the Query Club, what really drove Bevan and inspired him for the rest of his career."
In 1929, he was elected as MP for Ebbw Vale, and went to Westminster, where he quickly gained a reputation as a powerful speaker.
"These debates and arguments over ideas were really important in shaping Bevan's outlook as well," he added.
"One of Bevan's strengths was his debating skills and his ability to deconstruct arguments."
The Tredegar Medical Aid Society Heritage Centre pays tribute to the town's most famous son, who revolutionised health care for ordinary people
An image of Aneurin Bevan speaking into a microphone has been enlarged and displayed on one wall of the Tredegar Medical Aid Society Heritage Centre. He has a finger raised mid-speech. The works "We will Tredegarise you!" and the Welsh equivalent "Fe gewch chi'ch Tredegareiddio!" and written in cursive script nearby. An interactive screen is visible in front of the image, and an open door leading to a hallway on the right of the picture.
Images of Bevan, Tredegar's most famous son, adorn the shelves and wall of the heritage centre.
But Morgan says many members of the Query Club went on hold positions of influence for decades.
"There was Archie Lush, who became Sir Archie, who was his [Bevan's] agent, and there were other locals who became local councillors, mayors," he said.
Written on the walls of the heritage centre is the quote attributed to Bevan about creating the NHS in 1948: "We will Tredegarise you."
Davies believes this is probably apocryphal and never actually said by Bevan, but adds: "It does explain the legacy of the Tredegar Medical Aid society, that this was the foundation for the NHS."
Margaret Owen is led down in a hospital bed, with a breathing tube under her nose. She has short silver hair and her eyes are shut.
A young girls wearing glasses with blonde hair rests her chin on the shoulder of a woman with brown hair and glasses. An island surrounded by water is seen behind them.
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