Don’t throw out those old notebooks. You never know when they might come in handy.

Jonathan Issacs, news editor of the South Wales Evening Post, was surprised when a story he covered as a cub reporter hit the headlines again this week.

Police launched a murder-style investigation, following the discovery of human bones in an outbuilding at a Swansea Valley pub. They were later identified as those of the pub’s landlady who disappeared 27 years ago.

Jonathan told HoldTheFrontPage: “When she went missing, back in autumn 1973, there was no suspicion of foul play. It was one of the first stories I covered as a reporter.”

At the time Jonathan had just started work on the Herald of Wales, a sister paper of the Evening Post.

A year after landlady Barbara Maddocks vanished, Jonathan returned to interview her husband William at the pub The Aubrey Arms.

The pub had been bought originally by Mr Maddocks’ mother and is now run by the couple’s son Hywel.

Mr Maddocks died about eight years ago.

The day before the remains were identified from dental records, son Hywel Griffiths, who took his mother’s maiden name, told the Post in an exclusive interview that he did not believe the remains were hers. He said no-one had been in the outbuildings since 1947 because they were considered unsafe.

A skull was found by builders ten minutes after they entered the outbuilding to do some repair work for Mr Griffiths.

Jonathan Issacs, who has been news editor at the Post for five years, said he had forgotten all about the vanishing landlady story until this week’s news broke.

A rag-out of his original investigation in the Herald of Wales from more than a quarter of a century ago was used to illustrate the Post’s page one splash on the grim discovery.

Jonathan was also interviewed on BBC Radio 5 Live’s Drive show about the story and his involvement.

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