Now, where’s that again?

Posted on March 14, 2013 by kenb

It is always exciting to receive new donations to the archives, to get them into proper order and capture information about collections for future generations to enjoy. But sometimes archives can be puzzling.

Midlothian Archives have recently started to catalogue a large collection donated by a man called Andrew Fraser. Andrew was once a well-known character in Midlothian and amongst other achievements became county librarian of Midlothian.

Amongst the Fraser collection is a small photograph album containing about twenty sepia toned prints. These date from the Edwardian era and many of them feature unidentified people, but there are also several landscape shots that we would like to identify.

Do you know where any of these places are? Please let us know.

Feeding racing pigeons at an unidentified location

This man is feeding racing pigeons. Is it at Waverley Station in Edinburgh?

Large unidentified house

A beautiful large house somewhere. But where?

Large unidentified house

Another large house with plenty of character. But where? East Lothian?

Unidentified country cottage

Beach in East Lothian

Finally, where is this beach with its distinctive pavillion? It looks like the Bass Rock in the background which would place it in East Lothian. Is it still there?

Thistle Lodge of Free Gardeners, Penicuik

Posted on March 14, 2013 by kenb

Thistle Lodge of Free Gardeners, Penicuik

: Free Gardeners Lodge, Penicuik 1908

The Black Collection is a remarkable record about Penicuik and surrounding area from 1880 to 1930. It is named after James Black and his son Robert, who assembled a mass of material about life in Penicuik. The collection includes research and lecture notes, newspaper cuttings, notebooks, postcards, photograph albums and many other items.

Amongst the collection is a large ammount of material about the Thistle Lodge of Free Gardeners, Penicuik. The Ancient Order of Free Gardeners was a fraternal society that was founded in Scotland in the middle of the seventeenth century. It later spread to England and Ireland although it was principally a Scottish phenomenon. Like numerous other friendly societies of the time, its principal aim was to share knowledge amongst those working in a particular profession and also to provide mutual aid and insurance for its membership. In the nineteenth century, the latter activity became predominant. The Free Gardeners always remained independent of Freemasonry, but the history and organisation of the two orders show numerous similarities. By the end of the twentieth century, the Gardeners had become almost entirely extinct.

Free Gardeners Lodge, Penicuik 1909

The Thistle Lodge of Free Gardeners, Penicuik was formed in June 1822 from members of an earlier order called the Hand Papermakers’ Society (Penicuik was a centre of the paper making industry). The Gardeners were a highly visible presence in Penicuik and held annual walks and feasts, church services, concerts, sales of work and excursions. The Order had very specific rules and members were entitled to wear special regalia, sashes and badges. It would appear that in Penicuik at any rate membership was not very restrictive and open to almost everybody (except, of course, women).

Gardeners demonstration on Bridge Street, Penicuik 1909

Robert E Black, who compiled the Black collection, was an enthusiastic member of the Penicuik Gardeners and at one time acted as secretary of the local branch. His collection contains a good deal of material about the local Order, including dinner menus, press cuttings, concert programmes and photographs of members. As secretary of the Gardeners, he wrote a short history of the Order in Penicuik which was published in 1910. His collection is a treasure trove for any researcher with an interest in this little known but important aspect of Scottish culture.

Page from scrapbook on the Free Gardeners, Penicuik

New donations to Midlothian Archives 2012

Posted on December 24, 2012 by kenb

Midlothian Local Studies is a treasure house of local and family history. Based in Loanhead, it is run by Midlothian Council Library Service and is a unique collection about all aspects of Midlothian history and culture.

The collection is always growing and in 2012 many new donations were received from local people.

Amongst these were two collections of photographs about Loanhead. One was given by the family by the late Ernie Tiernan, a local shopkeeper, and the second from the estate of Jim Abbot, a professional photographer.

The photographs are a wonderful record of life in Loanhead in the twentieth century. They show streets, buildings, shops, people and events, including Gala Days and the Queen’s visit to Loanhead in June 1961. Each photograph is being carefully catalogued and local people are helping to identify them.

One fascinating photograph shows a women’s football team. There are no details with the photograph, but it seems to date from around the First World War and may show munitions workers either at Loanhead or Roslin gunpowder works.

Amongst other donations, Roslin Primary Schoolgave a large collection of class registers and photograph albums. These will be of great interest to genealogists in the future.

The family of James Braidwood of Bonnyrigg donated an Air Raid Warden’s notebook that he had kept during the Second World War. This shows regular nightly inspections of the local area to ensure that everybody was obeying the rules during the blackout.

Today’s news is tomorrow’s history. David Adams of Loanhead donated a set of photographs of the Olympic torch on its journey through Loanhead in June 2012, which was a memorable and historic event.

Penicuik Historical Society have recently undertaken a major project on papermaking and the Society gave Local Studies a series of transcripts of interviews with former workers in local mills. These are an invaluable record of a once thriving local industry.

Local Studies also received the records of the Pentland Conservation Group, a local environmental action group which did much valuable work to preserve historic Pentland Cemetery.

2014 will mark the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War. One poignant donation was a memorial plaque, commonly known as a ‘Deadman’s Penny’, belonging to Private John Watson, a Bonnyrigg soldier who joined the Royal Scots and who died at the battle of Arras in 1917.

Midlothian Local Studies thanks everyone who has made donations in 2012. New material is always welcome. Any of the items mentioned here can be viewed at Local Studies which is located at 2 Clerk Street, Loanhead and is free to use.

Who’s that girl?

Posted on December 10, 2012 by kenb

Midlothian Council Local Studies and Archives recently received a large donation of photographs of Loanhead and area. These had been collected by the late Ernie Tiernan, who was a well known Loanhead character. His family kindly donated the collection to the Midlothian archives.

Amongst the collection are some fascinating images of life in Loanhead, a former mining village just to the south of Edinburgh. The collection includes some lovely photographs of Loanhead Children’s Gala Day and long lost buildings in Loanhead.

Also amongst the collection is this photograph of a women’s football team. Unfortunately, there is nothing on the photograph to identify the team, but it seems quite early, probably from around the First World War. It may show muntion workers from the Roslin area, as there was a large munitons work in the area. Curiously there only seems to be ten players. Perhaps nobody wanted to be goalie.

There is the same mystery about this photograph of a car smash somewhere in the Loanhead area. What is the story?

And also for this lovely picture of Girl Guides. Who’s that girl? Can anybody identify them? Please let us know.

‘Miscellaneous’ Treasures in the City Archives

Posted on October 11, 2012 by vikkik

Playbill for Taylors-Hall, Cowgate

There are two collections within Edinburgh City Archives which contain a surprising mixture of interesting records; some of which are real treasures lying undiscovered by our readers due to them being absorbed into the rather indistinguishable ‘miscellaneous’ category of our catalogues. We have now pdf’d the catalogues and made them available in the Download section of our website.

The collections were put together many years ago and at the moment it would take too much time for us to start trying to unpick them to sort them into smaller individual collections; and so this is a solution to allow our readers better access to potentially useful and interesting records which may be difficult to find simply in the paper catalogues available in the public searchroom.

The first collection is SL12, imaginatively entitled ‘Miscellaneous Items and Deposits’, and contains treasures such as playbills for concerts at Taylors-Hall in the Cowgate from 1744; engravings of ruins following the Great Fires in Edinburgh between 15^th and 17^th November 1824; and a programme from the Edinburgh Abstainers’ Cycling Club 1892.

The other collection is SL15 (again very imaginatively called ‘Miscellaneous Photographs/Illustrations’) and contains images including interior shots of Craiglockhart Poorhouse; the ‘Old Edinburgh’ photographic collection from 1886; as well as several images of Town Council officials during the 20^th Century.

Craiglockhart poorhouse and hospital tuberculosis area

Why not have a look online and see if you unearth anything that may be of interest to you and get in touch with us. Please do note that some of these collections are held in our out-of-town repository and so would need to be ordered out in advance of any visit to our public searchroom.

For more information on where we are and how to get in touch with us please visit our website at www.edinburgh.gov.uk/cityarchives

Edinburgh’s Inter War Housing

Posted on August 17, 2012 by peterc

St Leonards Lane, 1920s

Sanitary improvements to the urban framework of Edinburgh had got under way in the later 19^th century with the work initiated by the Burgh’s first Medical Officer of Health, Sir Henry Duncan Littlejohn. (An outline of his life and work is available to view on this website under ‘Exhibitions’ on the ‘Discover the Records’ tab) Other improvements – including slum clearance – followed in the early 20^th century along with the increase in ‘general needs’ housing developments. These were responses to the growing shortages of dwellings within the city.

On the one hand the insanitary state of some of the then housing stock demanded a remedy. On the other, “slum clearance” – quite an emotive title – both in and around the Old Town was even at the time frowned upon by those anxious to preserve the character of ancient Edinburgh. One answer was what had become known as ‘conservative surgery’, an approach much less drastic than wholesale clearance and redevelopment. To a more limited extent, this was the method used with the St Leonard’s schemes of 1927 & 1929.

Located to the south of the Old Town of Edinburgh with a dense concentration of substandard housing, St Leonard’s

Gifford Park Backland

quite naturally became a candidate for remedial treatment. A series of wonderfully graphic photographs of the area prior to any improvement work survives within Edinburgh City Archives. These illustrate the magnitude of the problem faced by the Council

The overall approach was designed to move most of the residents out to purpose-built housing in the new schemes on the outskirts of the metropolis leaving the cleared areas to be redeveloped with lower density housing and increased public & private open spaces. The apparent dereliction of parts of the area as shown in the photographs, dictated a two stage approach with the 1^st sanitary improvement scheme promoted in 1927 and the 2^nd two years later in 1929.

Under stage 1 about 750 dwellings were cleared affecting 2600 residents who were rehoused primarily in the new Prestonfield estate. It involved 15 sites which were located roughly between Nicolson Street and the Pleasance. Stage 2 finally received central government endorsement in 1931 and, because of a building boom and a labour supply problem, took shape over the course of the 1930s. This was a bigger operation than the 1927 phase involving the clearance of 24 sites, 1600 dwellings, displacing 5600 residents and relocating most of them in the new Niddrie Mains estate. Although some of the original tenants were resettled in the area it is thought that this amounted to only around 10-15%.

St Leonards Improvement Scheme, 1927

The photographs, maps of reference drawn up for the redevelopments (see example here) together with the housing committee minutes and files preserved in the Archives give a comprehensive picture of these schemes and their impact on the urban and social character of the capital in the 1930s.

This Sporting Life…

Posted on June 15, 2012 by peterc

With the Olympic flame having recently passed through Scotland and the games themselves set to begin shortly, it is perhaps an appropriate time to reflect a little on Edinburgh’s sporting history. Among the many kinds of sport that the capital’s citizenry have enjoyed during bygone eras, athletics has played a significant role.

All eyes will undoubtedly be on Usain Bolt in London next month as he sets out to retain his Olympic 100 metre title but many of us will recall with pride and great pleasure the similar success of Edinburgh’s own Allan Wells who took the gold medal for this event in the 1980 Moscow Olympics, becoming the first Briton to win the event for over half a century.

Perhaps less well known is the fact that Allan began his amateur sporting career as a member of the Edinburgh Southern Harriers, one of three ‘Harriers’ clubs established in the later 19th century which opened up athletics, formerly a pastime of those educated in fee-paying schools and universities, to the wider working class of the city. The Southern Harriers were formed in 1897.

Edinburgh Southern Harriers, 1906-07

The surviving records of the Southern Harriers were gifted to ECA in 1999 just a few years after their amalgamation with the Edinburgh Athletic Club and they contain some interesting reading and fascinating images. The one reproduced to the left here is a photograph taken just the year before the club, together with its friendly, City rivals – the Edinburgh Northern Harriers – staged an inter athletic club competition as part of the Edinburgh International Exhibition of 1908. With a break of only seven years between 1914-1921 as a result of WW1, this sporting competition continued and grew to involve other athletic clubs within the capital until beyond the middle of the 20th century.

Edinburgh Southern Harriers results book, 1970-72

As noted above, the Southern Harriers amalgamated with the Edinburgh Athletic Club in 1996 but had flourished and helped develop the prowess of many of its aspiring members over the preceding decades. To return briefly to Allan Wells, the club records show that he was consistently recording times of around 11.0 seconds for the 100 metres in the early 1970s as the image here, taken from the results of 1972, illustrates. Within 8 years, as the Olympic record books show, Allan had not only taken the gold medal in the event winning the final in 10.25 seconds but had previously run a personal best of 10.11 in the qualifying heats .

If other Edinburgh sporting clubs hold historical records which they would like to see preserved for future generations please feel free to contact us in Edinburgh City Archives.

New Midlothian Archive Guide available

Posted on June 6, 2012 by kenb

In Spring 2012, Midlothian Council Archive Service launched a new guide to the Midlothian archives. The purpose of the guide is to raise awareness of the archive collection and to encourage greater use of it. Copies of the new guide are available from local libraries or from Midlothian Local Studies.

The Midlothian archive collection began shortly after the end of Second World War largely thanks to a man called Andrew Fraser, an unassuming native of Bonnyrigg who became county librarian for Midlothian County Library Service (then based inEdinburgh). Andrew had enough intelligence and foresight to start collecting material which was then regarded as insignificant and could be had for next to nothing. One example of this is a wonderful collection of old postcards of Midlothian. In Andrew’s day, these could be obtained quite cheaply, but are now very expensive and highly expensive.

Andrew Fraser saved a lot of archive material which was almost thrown away during local government reorganisation in 1970s. Amongst these were volumes of burgh records, council minutes, and logbooks and class registers from local schools. These records form the basis of the current collection, although there have been many later additions, usually donated by the public.

Currently, Midlothian archives are based in two sites: Library headquarters in Loanhead and at the Council Records Centre in Bonnyrigg, which is not open to the public. The collection is maintained by the Council Library Service. Midlothian Council has not employed a professional archivist for some years, but there is a Local Studies Officer and a Records Officer who jointly care for the archives.

The Midlothian collection is not vast, but there are plenty of interesting and unique items. Probably the best example is the Black Collection which contains over 150 scrapbooks about Penicuik and the surrounding area. These were compiled by two local men, James Black and his son Robert, from about 1880 to 1930. The scrapbooks record almost every aspect of life in Penicuik and are a rich source for local historians and genealogists.

The bulk of the archive collection comes from the nineteenth- and twentieth-centuries, but there are a few earlier items. These include eighteenth-century minute books from the Guild of the Dalkeith Hammermen, the Penicuik Farmers’ Society, Loanhead Subscription Library (1818-53), and the Trustees of the Burgh of Dalkeith, which began in 1760. There are also several family and estate collections, such as the Don Wauchope of Edmonstone papers, a prosperous family that lived at the Edmonstone house in the parish of Newton, just outsideEdinburgh.

The new archive guide is an attempt to summarise the Midlothian collection and to make it more accessible to users. The guide is organised into eight basic categories, such as Local Authority Records and Unions, Guilds and Associations. There is also an index and a glossary of unfamiliar terms. It is worth remembering that many people may be unfamiliar with archive collections and may not understand how they are organised. The guide was made as simple and clear as possible whilst maintaining the highest archive standards.

It is hoped that the new guide will be first in a series and that new versions will be produced at regular intervals. There is still plenty of material to be added and many new donations. Recently, we were given the punishment book from the Dalkeith Combination Poorhouse which records the penalties handed out to inmates for misbehaviour. This is a fascinating document that shows the harshness of the Victorian workhouse system. In February 1874, a woman called Jane Brunton, who was 23-years-old, was locked up for 8 hours and denied food for being insubordinate to the matron.

As well as the guide, we are also compiling new catalogues for individual collections. Once these are completed they are placed on the Midlothian Council website as PDFs. This is, of course, time-consuming but also rewarding and a good way to become more familiar with the collections and to uncover hidden treasures.

There is a huge amount of work to be done with theMidlothianarchives but we think that the new guide is big step in the right direction.

Volunteer!

Posted on April 28, 2012 by jennifert

Would you like to help West Lothian Council Archives in its work of preserving and enabling access to its historic collections? Anyone with spare-time and an interest in history or considering a career in the archives profession can volunteer in the Archives and Records Centre.

Volunteering provides an opportunity to work within a small friendly team, to use existing skills and learn new ones. It offers a unique perspective of archives and allows you to get up close and personal with historical documents and photographs.

Volunteers can assist in a variety of projects such as cleaning, sorting, listing and re-housing records, or help in the digitisation of some of the thousands of photographs and negatives held in the archives. Recent volunteers have been listing estate papers and the records of the Soroptimist Club of West Lothian; assisted with putting together exhibitions and promotional material for Livingston 50; and digitising negatives from the Bob Wallace collection and hundreds of LDC photographs.

The Archives has been awarded funding from the National Cataloguing Grants Programme for Archives to catalogue our Livingston collections. The funding award recognises these collections as being of national and international significance and the project coincides with the 50^th anniversary of the new town. Entitled “Livingston New Town, from Plan to Community, 1962-2012”, the project will involve cataloguing and preserving the records of Livingston Development Corporation; local Community Councils; Craigsfarm Community Centre; the Livingston Players; Tam Dalyell, MP; and the Reverend Dr. James Maitland. The project archivist will begin work on the 18 month project in July and there will be opportunities for volunteers to work on a number of different tasks and types of record. If you are interested in helping in this exciting project then please contact us by the end of July.

We also offer week-long work placements to local school pupils throughout the year, through the West Lothian work experience programme. The pupils are shown all aspects of the work carried out at ARC and are given small pieces of digitisation, preservation and indexing work to complete. We also encourage them (and our volunteers) to write blogs about their experience!

We consider all requests for voluntary placements or work experience, we provide basic training, and work with volunteers to develop an interesting and varied programme of work. If you are interested in volunteering some of your time please feel free to contact or visit the Archives and Records Centre.

Craigshill Mural

Posted on December 29, 2011 by emmap

One of the fulfilling aspects of working in an Archive is helping with and promoting programmes within the community that it serves. A recent enquiry highlighted this; from Julia Priestley, the Arts Development Officer at West Lothian Council, and Thomas Connelly, Library Manager asking for photographs of Craigshill as source material for a mural.

Craigshill is one of the oldest districts in Livingston, being one of the first areas built when the New Town was created. The mural project involving Arts Services/Community Regeneration entailed young people attending a local arts-based youth project Offbeat and working with an experienced public artist to create designs based on life in Craigshill over a period of time. These designs would then be applied to large mural pieces by artist Tom Ewing to the exterior of Almondbank Library in Craigshill.

Being a native of Craigshill, I was deputised to look out photographs from our extensive Livingston Development Corporation collection of images for buildings and landmarks that are memorable to those who’ve lived there.

Hopefully the images supplied, like this photograph of Craigshill fire station training tower would provide inspiring enough visual sources to help create a mural worthy of Almondbank Library and the community.

The mural was unveiled on the 30th September. Not long after I strolled up to have a look see and took some pictures.

The mural blends familiar house types, landmarks and features into an image that represents and embodies Craigshill to those who have lived there.

As well as the glimpsing the lives and activities of it’s inhabitants; from the past, and as seen through the eyes of those youngsters who took part in the murals creation.

As a repository that holds most of Livingston’s written and photographic history, we at the West Lothian Archives were more than happy to provide pictorial references to the project. As a resident of Craigshill for more than 40 years, I was particularly pleased and proud to have at least one of the photographs I sourced from our collection used as an element in the mural.

The Craigshill mural can be seen at Almondbank Library, The Mall, Craigshill, Livingston, West Lothian, EH54 5EJ

(Written by S. Thomas)

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Category Archives: Photographs