Excerpts from The Powys Montgomeryshire Village Book: "Visitors and residents who enjoy driving along the scenic Rhiw vally should be grateful to all those who opposed Liverpool Corporation's plans when they were considering, in 1889 and again in 1966, the flooding of the valley for use as a reservoir. The small villages of New Mills, Manafon and The Green in the parish of Manafon would have been lost and all the interesting facts of other lives and past years would have been gone forever, with no markers to remember them by.

There has been a church at Manafon since at least 1254, but the church as it is known today has been restored many times over the years."

From history.powys.org.uk: "This parish is an upland area of small farms with sheep on the hills. In Victorian times just about everbody in the parish would have been involved in working on the land or like the miller and the blacksmith providing a service to the farmer. Many of the farmers were tenants of the Powis estate." In 1841 there were 741 people in the parish.