Dragon was roaring as part of a 1980s’ technology revolution
JASON EVANS looks back at when a Welsh computer was the must-have Christmas gift
COME Christmas Day the wrappings will be ripped off the latest smart watch, games console, or voice-controlled assistant but there was a time when the latest must-have piece of electronics was a Welsh-made computer.
At a time when people carry incredibly powerful mini computers around in their pockets and call them smartphones, it is hard to overestimate the excitement of home computers back in the 1980s.
For the first time people could get their hands on affordable computers offering what seemed a world of opportunities – from playing games to doing the accounts. All you had to do was plug the machine into your TV, and hook up a cassette player to access the software – and then wait several minutes while the program loaded.
The machines were also programmable, meaning anyone could easily write their own software. It was a revolution.
The newly emerging market in the UK was dominated by companies such as Sinclair, Commodore, and Acorn’s BBC Micro – with the latter of these going on to become a feature in schools up and down the country.
Seeing an opportunity, Swansea toy company Mettoy decided to jump into home computing – and the Dragon was born.
Founded in Northampton by Jewish immigrants fleeing Nazi Germany, Mettoy had been a part of life in Swansea since it moved to the city after the Second World War. Business boomed, and in 1956 the Fforestfach firm launched the now-famous Corgi range of toy cars which would become a staple of many a childhood for generations to come.
Within a couple of years Mettoy was the biggest toy manufacturer in Britain, and a decade later was employing 3,500 people and opening a second site in Skewen, near Neath.
By early 1980 the new musthave items were home computers – and without any real experience in the technology sector, Mettoy decided to get involved.
It was a bold move from what was a “traditional” toy company, and with computing pioneer Sinclair struggling to deliver the keenly awaited
Spectrum machines, Mettoy decided to act fast.
The company based its design on an existing computer by the American producer Tandy, and with a few tweaks to the tech the Dragon 32 was launched in the summer of 1982.
In a major coup Mettoy persuaded high street giant Boots to stock the machines, along with the likes of Comet and British Home Stores, and the machines began flying off the shelves – in the run-up to Christmas that year the firm was selling thousands of machines a week.
So on Christmas Day in 1982 many people around the UK were