He chronicled the history, character and folklore of Monmouthshire, which he also called Gwent, in a series of nearly 800 newspaper articles and several books published between the 1920s and 1960s.

Hando was born in Maindee, Newport, Monmouthshire, the son of a postmaster Alfred and his wife Miriam, and attended school there.

[3] In his anthology of authors from the county, Monmouthshire Writers: A literary history, W. J. Townsend Collins suggests that Hando's experiences at the Battle of Vimy Ridge occasioned "something like a religious conversion - 'his eyes were opened so that he could see'".

In 1925 he was appointed as the first headmaster of Hatherleigh School in Newport,[5] where one of his pupils was Johnny Morris, later a noted radio and television presenter [see box].

Hando adopted an open and progressive teaching style and was described by Miriam Andrews, a former teacher at the school, as "a wonderful headmaster and he made the children very proud of Hatherleigh".

[7] Hando's aim in writing his articles was set out in the preface to his The Pleasant Land of Gwent, published in 1944; "to persuade readers to see the little places of a shy county".

[13] His scope was broader than buildings; in his foreword to the 1964 volume, Here and There in Monmouthshire, Edwin Morris, the then Archbishop of Wales, describes Hando's canvas as "reminiscence, folklore, local history, place names and introductions to interesting people, past and present, illustrated by his own beautiful drawings".

In his article on Allt-y-Bela, published in Journeys in Gwent in 1951, he wrote of the house's perilous state of dilapidation, noting "unless immediate and drastic action is taken, we shall lose priceless relics".

Hando wrote of, and drank and smoked in, a large number of the country's hostelries, the Robin Hood Inn, Monmouth being a particular favourite.

[26] Funded by public subscription, the seats were located in Dixton churchyard; at Llandegfedd Reservoir; on Lawrence Hill, Newport; at the top of the Wyndcliff, St. Arvans; and near Keeper's Pond on the Blorenge near Blaenavon.

His detailed chronicling of the county's history was referenced in the debate on the construction of an extension of the M4 motorway[29] across the Gwent Levels;[30] and the late Paul Flynn, former member of parliament for Newport West, recalled the "halcyon days" of Hando's columns in a discussion about declining journalistic standards at the South Wales Argus.