A WALK THROUGH THE PAST Memories of Old 1940s to the present day 2 Cover photo courtesy of West Council Libraries & Cultural Services

This booklet was published by Action with the support of the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Published in June 2018

Permission granted for personal and educational use only. Commercial copying, hiring and lending is prohibited. Obtain permission before redistributing. Selling is prohibited. All images are copyrighted to their respective owners. 3 INTRODUCTION

In March 2017 Action Old Kilpatrick see more images. The audio walks (AOK) were awarded funding by the will allow users to follow set routes Heritage Lottery Fund to undertake whilst listening to short audio clips an oral history project about the that let you ‘see’ the present as the history and heritage of the village past. In essence it will help bring the of Old Kilpatrick. Shortly thereafter past to life. a small group of AOK volunteers received training at the Scottish Obviously, any such project owes Oral History Centre, University of a debt of gratitude to many. We and began the process would therefore like to thank the of interviewing residents of the Heritage Lottery Fund for their village. In total, 27 people kindly support without which the project agreed to share their memories would have remained as a nice which were digitally recorded, idea. Of course, an enormous thank summarised and analysed. Birth you is owed to those who so kindly dates of the interviewees ranged agreed to share their memories from the early 1930s to the 1970s and photographs with us. Even which allowed an exploration of with financial support, without the how things used to be as well as contribution of the undernoted we recording the changes that have would have had no project at all. So occurred from the Second World thank you to: War to the present day. A selection June Alderdice, Anne Alexander, of edited memories can now be Florence Boyle, Evelyn Campbell, found in this booklet presented Carol Cummings, Jim Dunbar, Billy alongside fascinating images, Forstyh, Edith Girvan, Irene Howarth, many of which were generously John Hood, Sheena Johnston, Jim donated by the interviewees. For Kirkpatrick, Maggie Larkin, Carol those relatively ‘new’ to the village Mackenzie, Myra Mackenzie, Kenny we’re sure you’ll be amazed at the MacKenzie, Jim McCall, Eddie changes that have taken place. Who McDade, Lucinda McGinty, Maureen today would go for a swim in the McKeever, Kenny Miller, George Clyde? Mirren, Rona Mirren, Tom Morrison, In addition to this booklet AOK have Elma Robertson, Owen Sayers, David also created two audio walks and a Stormonth and Steve Woods. new website where you can hear the memories of those interviewed and 4

Photo courtesy of NCAP © HES 5

Situated between and engaged with both young and old and are accessible using any , the village of Old members of the local population smartphone or mp3 player. A series Kilpatrick is bounded to the south seeking their assistance and of sound clips taken from the by the shores of the participation in helping to create oral histories have been blended and to the north by the Kilpatrick a digital, historical legacy that will together with ‘voiceover’ sections Braes. Over the decades it has been now be made fully accessible for providing basic directions and witness to many social, economic use by anyone with an interest in the information that can be listened and cultural changes and yet retains history and heritage of the village to at various points or sections a distinctive ‘village’ identity. On its and its surroundings. Fully trained along well-established and safe outskirts it has a long history of rural volunteers digitally recorded the pathways. Significant points of life whilst its proximity to the Clyde, testimonies of 27 residents of Old local history and heritage include the famous shipyards, the Forth & Kilpatrick and used this primary the Forth & Clyde Canal, the Clyde Canal and a major railway source material along with other Bridge, a former bus depot (the line all signify historical links to its historical data to create a series of site of a Roman Fort), the former heavily industrialized neighbours. interesting and dynamic outcomes Lanarkshire and Dunbartonshire The post-war decline of shipbuilding such as an audio walk, a new web- Railway, the current railway station and heavy engineering have now based database and this illustrated (formerly the Dumbarton been replaced by smaller industries booklet. The project has also & line), local housing, whilst a rise in tourism and leisure delivered a new oral history archive shops and businesses, formal and pursuits such as walking and cycling which will be added to the existing informal play areas and the Glen and has brought many new visitors to oral history collections belonging Saltings; important natural habitats the area. to Council and leisure areas. Unlike other more Libraries and Museums. The project traditional monuments, the audio This project, funded by the Heritage has therefore helped expand the walks will provide an immediate and Lottery Fund, was led by Action knowledge and understanding of the intimate experience of past events, Old Kilpatrick (AOK), a recently history and heritage of Old Kilpatrick helping to reinvigorate an interest in formed, fully constituted community to its own population as well as to the local history and heritage. The group of volunteers who are wider audiences. audio walks will also provide the actively interested in enhancing additional health benefit of taking the environment and celebrating Two audio walks link spoken exercise! the heritage of Old Kilpatrick. They memories with specific places

The audio walks and more information about the project, as well as audio clips, photographs and other material we collected about Old Kilpatrick, its history and people can be found on the project website:

www.awalkthroughthepast.org.uk 6

AUDIO WALK 1 The walk starts in the village centre and takes the walker along Dumbarton Road, to the , through the Saltings and up Ferry Road back to Dumbarton Road and to the start of the walk at the village shops.

The walk is about 2 miles long and the route is indicated on the page opposite. The recording can be paused and restarted to fit with your walking speed.

The points marked on the map give an indication of the topics you can read about in this booklet and hear in the recording.

The audio walk recording can be downloaded from www. awalkthroughthepast.org.uk as an mp3 file and can be played on any smartpone, tablet or mp3 player.

Photo courtesy of Robert Fleming 7

R o m A82 a n C r es ce nt 4 5

3 Dumbarton Road

A82

START HERE 2 1 6 16 15 F or th Station Road a nd C ly de Ca nal

1. The village centre River Clyde 2. Dumbarton Road 3. Bus garage 14 4. Gavinburn school 5. Roman Crescent 6. The Forth and Clyde canal 7 7. The Clyde shore 8. 12 A898 Erskine Bridge 11 9. 10 10. Scout hall 13 11. Old train station 8 12. Barclay church 9 13. Memories of 14. Under the bridge 15. The Ettrick & the shops 16. The community 8 Just happy times. A nice place to grow up, Old Kilpatrick; people were friendly, people knew each other as well.

VE day celebrations (photo courtesy of Robert Fleming) 9 THE VILLAGE It was an entirely The heart of the village is the centre with busy shops, pubs and a seating area with colourful flower beds. different village to In the 1960s, older two and three storey properties with shops what it is just now. underneath were swept away, some by compulsory purchase, in a wholesale redevelopment to create the shopping centre. This We just used to take created more open spaces and flats replaced shops. turns of going to

OLD KILPATRICK ON TV everywhere you went. You’d go out each other’s houses. Jim McCall for 5 minutes and come back an So I got to know ““When they built Thistleneuk, hour later but nowadays… I suppose there was a popular television it’s changed, like everything else. people that way. programme – ‘Tonight’ on BBC. I don’t think there’s the same There was a gentleman called community spirit anymore. But then I started to Fyfe Robertson; and famously Fyfe AWAY OUT IN NO-MAN’S LAND like it. And when I Robertson did a piece to camera Myra Mackenzie at Thistleneuk for the Tonight went further up into programme and it was to show how ““When I told girls at work I was council housing was developed. going with this guy, came from Old Kilpatrick they went “Old Kilpatrick, Glasgow or , IT'S CHANGE LIKE EVERYTHING do they still have the stagecoach I can’t suffer all this ELSE down there?” Because to us it was Irene Howorth away out in no-man’s land. But it noise, and trains and ““I don’t think it’s a village as such was just a lovely wee village to me, any more. I think just, you know, you know, and it was quite a nice buses and bustle. wee [village], and everybody knew folk come here to live but they No, I’ll just go back work in Glasgow, you know what I everybody and everybody was mean. You don’t know everybody related to everybody. So, I was just home. now like you used to. I mean I can a complete outsider. walk down to the village and I don’t Myra Mackenzie know anybody. Whereas in the old days it was “aw hello”, “hello”, “hello” 10 DUMBARTON ROAD

ladies’ toilet and, this is genuine, she Dumbarton Road runs through the whole village, connecting it to took the lady, an English lady I think on the east side and the A82 on the west. From early 1900s it was, outside and pointed across trams were running up it until 1960s when the tracks were dug up the road to the Telstar and said you and the new road built. During this time, many properties on either go in the lounge door and through side of the road were demolished to make way for the wider road. the back to the ladies’ toilet.

Thistleneuk estate was built on the north side and a couple of shops PUBS AND SHOPS across the road were demolished and flats were built in their place. Jim McCall ““I’m having to remember in the centre of the village we had the THISTLENEUK COMMUNITY and get into the orchard to steal nursery – Freddie Laing who was a Jim McCall apples but it didn’t work very well nurseryman opposite Kirkton. You [why not, what was preventing you?] We played football at the old had then auld Kirkton. There was ““ …Mrs Smith and her family would football park in Sunnyside where the old Ettrick Bar and that was auld be around and any time you tried it, Thistleneuk is now. There was a land behind it between the Ettrick they would be there. Sunnyside Park and that’s where and Erskine View and then there was we played most of our football, THE ETTRICK auld land that is now the Thistleneuk at Sunnyside. There was a strong Ken Miller housing estate - that was auld land community, and everyone got on - there was old housing in there. My pretty well. My recollection is that ““The pub was called ‘the vandal’s picture is of quite a lot of changes. we didn’t really identify each other nightmare’ because there was You had Kate’s Bar; we had Pirie the in terms of religion and that was the absolutely nothing you could Chemist; you had Davie Graham, general tenor of things round Old damage in the place. I even knew he was the newsagent; we had Bill Kilpatrick. You lived in Old Kilpatrick, the architect that designed the new Butler, he was quite a character and you came from there... end of... building. It lay for years and years he had probably what you would call whereas the dividing line was before it was rebuilt. The building a deli /off-licence – but at one stage between Old Kilpatrick and Bowling, was taken down and the pub never he had a chip shop in Station Road – OK and . closed. The ladies’ toilet was, you near where the police station is. had to come out and go up the THISTLENEUK ORCHARD close, and leave a girlfriend standing Carol Cummings at the mouth of the close and then you’d go out the back court and that This was an orchard... it was ““ was the ladies’ toilet. There was Smith’s orchard here. And see the no ladies’ toilet in the place! Some two posts as you come up the path tourists were in the snug one night there [Thistleneuk], that was the and, Mary was the manageress at orchard gate and we used to try the time, they said where was the 11

Top: Dumbarton Road with Gavinburn Place on the right, looking east (photo courtesy of SCRAN, © St Andrews University Library)

Left: Freddie Laing's nursery (photo courtesy of Robert Fleming)

Right: View from Dumbarton Road looking towards Thistleneuk (photo courtesy of Douglass Montgomery) 12 Back of Kirkton and Gavinburn Street, early 1970s (photo courtesy of West Dunbartonshire Council Libraries & Cultural Services 13

OLD KIRKTON HOUSES FRY’S SHOP special cup?” But it came from a Myra Mackenzie Rona Mirren spring, this water. It was absolutely ““Well it was the old Kirkton, you ““We went to Fry’s which was the gorgeous and they had it all lovely. know where Kirkton is, where the ethnic shop, the one right at the top But look at it now, there’s nothing, graveyard is, well that was the of Gavinburn Place, that belonged except a plaque. As many people old Kirkton and it was really old- to a guy called Fry. We were in there will come through and say “Can fashioned and I had a few friends in every morning. He was a grocer, you tell me where St. Patrick’s Well there [who] had children the same newsagents, he sold everything, he is?” And you’re embarrassed to say age as mine. So, the first time they sold like stuff for your school like that’s where it is now. invited me up there, I think it was jotters and pencils and rubbers and JIMMY WEIR’S GARAGE night time, and you went up, it was groceries, newspapers. We were Rona Mirren like a stair, and then it was a wee in there all the time. My Mum went landing. And she took me in to what there to get her paper and her rolls ““Jimmy Weir owned… he had a I would call the living room. So, she in the morning… and next door to garage where Kirk Crescent is. See said “Would you like tea or coffee?” Fry’s there was a grocer’s shop and the new build that is in that wee bit, and I said “I would love a coffee”. it was a big shop and it sold like Jimmy Weir he had a… Weir’s Buses, So, she came out the living room, loose potatoes and vegetables and that’s where he housed his buses, in out the front door and walked, that they sold meat. They had like a deli there he had about four or five buses way, you know in this wee corridor. counter they call it now, but they had and that’s where he had his buses in And I went.., she said “It’s aw right, a counter with cheese and different there. my kitchen’s out here.” So, they had things in it. And then there was a to walk actually out the door, across like a house and then down a wee this landing and into the kitchen. bit there was a coloured gentleman So, I said “Do you think I could use who had that shop, we were quite But it was a lovely your toilet?” And she said “Oh wait a pally with him, he used to let me minute till I get a torch.” So, I went..., work the tills and all that and let me community down and she went “I’ll need to show you serve just because I wanted to and where it is.” So, she took me down he was nice, you know. And there there, you know. the stairs, round the back, and a big, was a café before that building big long walk right up the back to the society had that, but I don’t think the Everybody spoke and toilets. I said “How do you manage café paid, so it closed down. helped each other at night time and that?” She said “Oh we’re used to it and we love it.” But it SWING PARK AT THE WELL out. If somebody was a lovely community down there, Myra Mackenzie you know. Everybody spoke and ““There was a wee swing park wisnae in for their helped each other out. If somebody there and it had two wee baby wisnae in for their children coming swings and two ordinary swings. So, children coming from from school, they would look after I used to take [my son] down there them. And then facing that was St. so as he got bigger he was in the school, they would Patrick’s Well and it was a well then, bigger swing and he’d say “Can I go look after them. with the wee iron cup and a chain. up to the well to get a drink out the 14 Photos courtesy of Alex Strachan and Alistair Douglas BUS GARAGE

Throughout the 1930s the Scottish 1955 and 1965 with buses carrying Buses. As the need to rationalise its Motor Traction Company, Limited, passengers from all over West network pressed upon management, of (SMT) gained control Dunbartonshire to and from a decision was taken to close the of the vast majority of privately- shipyards, engineering workshops, depot, virtually sixty years on from owned bus services across the factories such as Singer’s, and to its opening, in May 1996. country. Two subsidiary companies the various villages and schemes were formed in 1932: Western on the Old Kilpatrick hillsides. For a brief period a local campaign SMT, in the south-west; and Central Leisure also created demand with was launched to try and purchase SMT, in Lanarkshire, and West people wanting to be transported to the Depot and establish a Roman Dunbartonshire. In August 1936 the shops, cinemas, sports events and Fort visitor centre. However, First ‘very modern’ Gavinburn Depot was even day touring. These demands Bus decided to sell the Gavinburn opened to absorb and replace other were met by Gavinburn Depot which Depot and eecently it has acted as outlying depots. Old Kilpatrick had by the mid-1950s had a weekly a storage yard and indoor football been chosen for its convenience vehicle mileage of around 131,000 centre. miles, carrying around 678,000 for both city and country terminals Source: Alex Strachan and now Gavinburn offered covered passengers. The 250 drivers and capacity for over 120 buses. 280 conductors took care of the HALLOWEEN business. Lucinda McGinty During the , of March 1941, buses from Gavinburn With the rise of private car ““I remember at Halloween we were among the first relief vehicles ownership, and other uncontrollable went round the whole village. [We] to assist with subsequent mass factors, passenger loadings all ended up in the bus garage evacuation. The depot location suffered. Larger buses, reduced because the conductors and the made traffic movements possible, frequencies, one-person operation, drivers used to give us all the to the west and north, away from and finally whole service cuts, pennies and halfpennies. But dangers in the urban areas. Drivers charted the decline of buses from we had to sing or say a poem or and conductors braved the air raids; the Old Kilpatrick Depot. Larger do something. You didn’a go to some platform staff are known to single deck buses began to replace the door and say “Trick or Treat” have displayed great selflessness the ubiquitous red double deckers It was “please can we have our and physical courage, as well and by the end of the 1970s Halloween?” if they were going to as acts of compassion towards conductors were being phased out. let you, they’d say “Right what you wounded and displaced. The deregulation of public transport going to do?” and usually you had in 1986 brought further changes it all rehearsed, you knew what you Post-War, bus travel enjoyed with running their were doing. My friends and that we continuous expansion with new blue and yellow liveried buses out of used to go – I mean, there was nay bus production flooding in from Gavinburn until the summer of 1989 costumes, you got your mother’s around 1947/48 onwards. The when they reverted once more to red clothes on or your father’s clothes service network peaked between with the formation of Kelvin Central on and bonnets and... that was it. 15 16 GAVINBURN SCHOOL

It was a great wee primary school. The school was in use from 1887 until 1941 when the main part of it was bombed in the 1941 Blitz. All the local children went and had By 1949, four classrooms were operating from two huts and by 1953, when the school roll was great fun at the sports days. It 362 pupils, part-time education was in place. In 1954 the new school was opened with the infant was a nice school. extensions added in 1975. Irene Howorth

CAROL’S CLASS it was at the latter end of the war Kilpatrick Boys Club, with a football. Carol Mackenzie experience, which was still very I remember it was signed with all ““There were two classes of the prominent… well, I never experienced the players. They’d won some, I don’t same age. My husband was in that really, but that was still know if it was a Scottish tournament the other class. He, they were, the uppermost in peoples’ minds, so we or something but they’d won it older ones were put in one class played a lot of sort of war games. and my brother’s name was on it and then I was in the younger class because he played football for them LIBRARY at one time. But I remember going because I was a later birthday. There Carol Mackenzie were more boys than girls in my there when I was young. And I used class. I was in the room where the ““I used to go there to vote with to go in to vote as well. It was just nursery is now in Gavinburn. That’s my Dad and my Mum. And my Dad a nice place. It’s a shame its gone. where the two primary one classes would go and take me up there and These things happen. were because the nursery wasn’t we’d to the library and it was just obviously there and they hadn’t a nice atmosphere in the library Photo courtesy of Elma Robertson built the extension, so we were as well. You knew it was in the class, which was outside, part of the school before, primary one just across from the but it had a nice feeling headmaster. to it, and nice displays, and I remember when I WAR GAMES was older going in, taking Billy Forsyth the kids in from school, ““In school, we used to have a lot would take them in there of fun in the school playground. I to go to the library and can remember playing “kingy” and get a visit and see what dodge -ball and various other sort of there was and the displays military type things – well, obviously, and they’d a display of 17 ROMAN CRESCENT

THE ARRIVAL there was lots of traffic on the canal ground they camped down Bowling Evelyn Campbell - primarily puffers and fishing boats shore and I surmise that they’d ““My first memories were, in actual coming from the east. camped there - this is going back for fact, we arrived on a horse and cart many generations. PREFABS with all the furniture. I remember Jim McCall jumping off and running down the We weren’t scared of them, we were path and running up to this new ““After the Second World War, aware of them. They would come house – it was upstairs – it was huge shortage of housing. The round the housing, sharpening a four in the block and we were government needed to build knives and forks and general upstairs. It was coal fires and we housing quickly and the prefabs bartering, maybe do a bit of palm had a back to back hearth and my were functional and could be built reading or what have you... they Mum used to hang our socks up very quickly. At the top of Roman were very much part of the Scottish at night in the kitchen – it kept the Crescent before you come down the scene. In the summer months there kitchen warm and we had a coal fire road... the scheme wasn’t there - would be the 'tinkers' camp. It was a in one of the bedrooms too. there were a number of prefabs built big black tarpaulin – you could smell there, not many, probably about a their camp fire – it was very exotic! THE DUMPS dozen prefabs. We were about the Jim McCall first one off the Dumbarton Road, GAMES AT THE CIRCLE Sheena Johnston ““The workings from the building on the left. We had a garden, a front of the houses - and there was a and back door. The novel feature ““That was what we called ‘the lot of sand up at that end of the was the fact that you had a fridge circle’ and we would meet and we’d scheme, huge big piles of sand; and in the kitchen, which was a great come out at night and play skipping between the houses on one side of luxury: it was unknown to have a ropes and, you know, play the beds Roman Crescent, and the housing fridge! and the chalk on the pavement. And where the old prefabs had been, we had a great game called tracking. THE 'TINKERS' CAMP We’d put wee arrows and we’d all at the top end of Roman Crescent, Jim McCall that divide between the houses was try and find our way to this special primarily woodland and we called it ““Then of course there was place that you’d go to. It was all The Dumps – again because there the other presence of the 'tinker' great you know. You were out all the was lots of workings – I remember community; adjacent to Roman time. lots of sand there. There were very Crescent was a piece of land that’s few trees or foliage, it was all a huge now used as a kind of boatyard at big play area of sand, it was a great the canal house: that was called the area to play. And then on the other 'tinkers' park. So that was a camping side of the house of course we had site, the 'tinkers' would regularly the canal, which was busy because camp there - as well as that piece of 18 THE CANAL

BARGES ON THE CANAL DANGEROUS CANAL Anne Alexander Steve Woods ““Ah….well, I can well remember ““It was just generally regarded the Forth & Clyde canal and, at that as being dangerous. It was still time, at the time of the Blitz, there a very active waterway, so it was were barges going up and down deep in the wintertime, it could be from Bowling constantly and they particularly dangerous because of were being pulled by big Clydesdales the formation of ice which often and I never was quite sure what wasn’t thick or strong enough to was on the barges but there was support a child. So we were all certainly plenty of barge and horse intimidated by our parents not to traffic. And also alongside the... go there. But in most cases it didn’t from the canal bridge at Erskine stop us, but I think we had a healthy Ferry, there was a whole crowd of respect for it. Photo courtesy of Elma Robertson piggeries and that’s when the guys used to come around for the all the DROWNINGS Owen Sayers all used to go down there and swim. leaves and peelings and so on and Because I’d say “Where are they?” that was fed to the pigs. ““The canal was a bit of a focus and their Dad would say “They’ll at that time because over the years PUFFERS AND THE FISHING be in the canal swimming.” They it wasn’t uncommon for kids to fall thought that was the big swimming SMACKS in the canal. I remember probably Jim McCall pool. And they used to dive off the two or three that were drowned in bridge into the canal. ““The puffer traffic taking the coal the canal and I can remember the to Bowling and also in the summer crowds that were out on the canal DERELICT CANAL months we’d get the fishermen banks and men diving in trying to Kenny MacKenzie coming through from the east and see if they could find somebody who Towards the mid-1970s the canal we would frequently help - that was had been reported as having fallen was very, very derelict and I suppose great fun to open up the lock gates in. the Millennium initiative really for them, to see the water flooding did breathe new life into it. But I back into the lock. It was mainly SWIMMING IN THE CANAL Myra Mackenzie quite clearly remember being at a puffers and the fishing smacks, photographic trip with my dad and as we called them. Other than that ““The canal, the kids used to swim not being able to follow the tow-path there wasn’t any tourist traffic. I in, in the summer, you know, and you as it was completely overgrown. So do remember some barges – I do would see them all out swimming. that was early 1970s… you know the recollect the horse pulling a barge: But it was clean then, it was clean. weeds, the brambles and the nettles horse drawn in the ‘fifties. But I could never swim but the kids had reclaimed everything. 19

FERRYDYKE COTTAGE Jim McCall ““The cottage (at Ferrydyke) was lived in. I don’t recollect those stables being used. But adjacent to the cottage there was a piggery. Gibby his name was, Gibby. He ran the piggery and he would come round and we would give him the scrapings, you know, from the veg and there was a bin that was set aside for the pigswill. And he would collect the scrapings and put it into his... not sure if it was a car... an old vehicle; and these bins would be full of all sorts of eggshells and... and then he’d boil it up and feed it to the pigs. But lots of people kept pigeons and hens – even in Roman Crescent. Lots of my friends would have pigeons – it was just as a hobby. And some people kept hens in the back Photo courtesy of SCRAN garden. Obviously they fed the hens and then they © Council would slaughter them.

We weren’t allowed to go near the canal… if we did… my mother didn’t know about it.

Evelyn Campbell

Photo courtesy of SCRAN Photo courtesy of Owen Sayers © Newsquest (Herald & Times) 20 THE CLYDE SHORE Photos courtesy of Elma Robertson

The Saltings is an area between the village and the river made up of regenerated woodland and meadow. It was originally a salt marsh, locally known as the Planting, prone to tidal influences and fed by fresh water burns, the Dalnottar (or Lusset) Burn and the Gavin Burn. These burns were re-routed along the sea wall when the Forth and Clyde Canal was built (c1790) and when the railway closed, the whole site was filled with rubble to carry the foundations for the Erskine Bridge.

FAVOURITE SPOT Bowling shore was the short stretch cleaner but I can remember opening John Hood of sand on the Erskine side, beside my eyes, you know swimming The shore was a favourite spot for Erskine Hospital. It was once a underwater, and thinking ‘oh gee locals and visitors alike especially popular picnic area in the summer wizz’ you could hardly see it was like during the summer months. Visitors and attracted hordes to site, build foggy, you know. sandcastles and swim. would shelter under the mud banks SHIPYARDS and set up stall there laying out SWIMMING IN THE CLYDE June Alderdice towels and starting fires to boil up Elma Robertson tea and roast potatoes. A particular ““When we stayed up at Erskine sport was to go further into the ““It certainly wasn’t as clean a Ferry, it was during the war, and water when ships were going down place as it is now when we went there was Findlay’s Yard and there river. This would result in the river picnics there but we did go… and we was Napier and Miller’s - but I don’t receding before charging back swam, in the Clyde, and when I think know if Napier and Miller’s came in. Tugs created the best effect! on it now what it was like then. I after Findlay’s boatyard. And you Another popular spot to rival the mean you could swim now… it’s a lot could hear the noises, you know, Aircraft carrier on the Clyde with Freelands prefabs in the foreground 21 (photo courtesy of Owen Sayers)

The Napiers yard was there at one time, but I don’t know if there was any ship building activity, or ship breaking activity that the working, but it didn’t bother me; head down to the Bowling shore. went on there. Napiers but the river was quite foggy in the We’d walk right down the shore at winter and you always heard the Old Kilpatrick and along… bypass yard was along where boats’ horns going. Donald’s Quay, as it was called, The the tanks and the oil White Perch, and we’d go down to SHIPS ON THE CLYDE the Bowling shore. We’d build a fire depot was... they’d be David Stormonth and make toast - that was good fun ““The ships going up and down as well. I really enjoyed that… we’d pumping oil. I believe it the Clyde as well: there was many be away the whole day. a memorable night... we had was along in that area. the Queen Elizabeth, we had the SMELLY SCOUTS Jim McCall Waverley going down the Clyde. Other factories that ““Well, the water wasn’t too good – I remember was the Special days when you knew that it was full of the flotsam and jetsam something was going to happen... as it still is to this day. A more Aurora Light Company. the sailing ships going up to attractive destination was to take Glasgow recently, you knew that the Erskine Ferry. Adjacent to the There were lots of was going to happen, everyone was Ferry on the Erskine side there was down at the front watching and – still is – a nice parcel of sandy little businesses seeing things like that you know. beach and that was a favourite spot. Above the beach line there right enough... coal TOAST AT THE SHORE was a camping ground and that was Billy Forsyth frequented by the Scouts from all businesses and scrap ““Another time, what we would areas of Glasgow. I was a regular metal. occasionally do is, we’d take bread attender at the Catholic Church at out of the house (plain bread), me Old Kilpatrick. Lots of members of and my pal, and we’d take a pack of the Scout troop would stride down Billy Forsyth butter, when my Mum wasn’t looking, to the Church smelling of smoke and and a couple of forks, and we’d sodden kilts. 22 ERSKINE BRIDGE

DOMINANT STRUCTURE PROGRESS IS COMING Due to changing economic Jim McCall George Mirren and social circumstances the ““Such a huge structure, such ““When they started putting up the Erskine Ferry came under a dominant structure. Not many bits for roads and all this it was a increasing pressure to carry local people were employed in the bit of shambles right enough but it traffic and passengers across building of it: it was all contracted had to be done. But, you watched the River Clyde. It was therefore labour from elsewhere. There was them and how great it was when decided to build a new bridge interest in it, but to some extent they were putting the sections in. It that would cope with the it was by-passing the village. So was like two big arms and they were then current and anticipated although there was a huge dominant sitting… I mean the weight on them… increases in traffic and allow structure, it didn’t actually bring they were like parts of a ship the shipping to use the River Clyde much commerce to the village. I do size of them tae be put on there and without interruption. In 1963, remember driving over it just after it then they welded them and then the Freeman Fox & Partners were was opened and it was fantastic. next one… they would… over again, appointed as the consulting until they got there. engineers and they were joined THE VILLAGE SHOOK in 1965 by W.A Fairhurst Myra Mackenzie I mean, you had the riveters, you & Partners who designed ““I remember the bridge getting know, along with welders and all that the foundations and the 14 built. The whole of Old Kilpatrick on the [Erskine] bridge and they were reinforced concrete piers. In shook because they were going working all hours there, you know, 1967, at the beginning of its down that depth for the cement and and then as I say it was more the construction, the new bridge the whole of Old Kilpatrick used to people down here that was getting was designed as the longest shake. the noise. But what can you do when of its type in the world (a total progress is coming? length of 1322m) and would THE FOG eventually cost £10.5 million Owen Sayers OUR BRIDGE Kenny MacKenzie to build. It is a cable-stayed ““The sad thing was we were never girder bridge, has a clearance able to see the two ends of the ““Being a west-coaster there is over high water of 180 feet and bridge joining because the morning always that kind of rivalry with the was built to withstand winds of that they were doing the joining it east coasters and Edinburgh in up to 130mph. On 2 July 1971 was so foggy that the bridge was particular. And they had the Forth the Erskine Ferry made its final enveloped in fog. So, we know it Road Bridge so this was our wee bit journey across the river and the was going on but we couldn’t see of civil engineering that matched new Erskine Bridge was opened it. I think we saw it on the Pathe the Forth Road Bridge - possibly not by HRH Princess Anne. Newsreels… oh, or did we have in scale but certainly in technical television then? I think it was on the development. It’s quite a unique news on television… yeah, it was. construction. 23 We never got any sleep. It was horrendous, the noise was terrible. 24 hours a day, day shift, night shift, non-stop.

Carol Cummings

Photo courtesy of SCRAN © Newsquest (Herald & Times)

Photo courtesy IT WAS A NICE NIGHT of Douglass Florence Boyle Montgomery Before it was open to traffic, they opened the bridge to pedestrians, just that night, so she [Princess Anne] was there whatever day it was and that evening you were allowed to walk across it. My father came up and we all walked across and back and had a look at the view… I remember it being a nice night. 24 ERSKINE FERRY

CROSS THE FERRY FOR A PENNY so they always warned you to stay times she used to row him across John Hood away from the chain because as it to his work in the morning. And one You could cross on the Ferry for got to the slipway the chain would of the times she was rowing across a penny (several times back and rise from the water and it would be or rowing back and this fishing boat forth if you could avoid the ticket quite a thump – exciting! was coming along and they kept collector). At the foot of Ferry blowing the klaxon at her and she BUSY FERRY was getting madder and madder Road on the stone cobbled wet Ken Miller slipway was the little wooden ticket and signalling to them and then she office for the ferry with its two-way ““And of course, the ferry was realised they were calling to her. turnstile system which segregated very, very busy, particularly on hot So it was a herring boat and when the foot passengers from the vehicle summer days. There were lots and they came close to her they said traffic. In the early evening the lots of cars. They queued right along ‘have you got a bucket or anything newspaper vendors would stand the middle of the road, past the café, in there?’ and she said ‘yes’ and they here selling papers. Waiting ferry and then down Ferry Road. So, the said ‘well give me it over’ and he passengers had to watch that they café did remarkably well. The petrol filled her bucket with herring. But avoided the moving chains that station must have been ok because when we thought on it… imagine, whipped up and down. The ferry was people wouldn’t judge the correct rowing your father across to work also used by ‘tattie howkers’ (such amount of fuel for the length of time and back. But she was another as myself) crossing over to the in the queue. At the other side, they tough one, the two grannies were farms in Bishopton. had marker posts, like milestones, tough ladies. and they would say 40 minutes, 30 CHAIN FERRY minutes, 20 minutes and so on but GOING TO ANOTHER WORLD Steve Woods Jim McCall you had no knowledge here. Bert in ““I think people were sad to see the café did very well because you The ferry was fascinating, it was like the ferry go. We knew the people would send the kids in and out. going to another world, not because who worked on the ferry and it was Erskine and the countryside on the ROWING TO WORK other side of the river was really gainful employment and people who Elma Robertson were employed had worked on the different, but it just seemed to have ferry for many, many years. So it was ““My grandmother used to live on a mystery to it since we could only kind of sad to see it... I think it was the other side […] my father always look at it and not touch it. only about a penny or tuppence to said he was an incomer [to Old Kilpatrick] because he didn’t come TATTIE HOWKING get across. But it was a marvellous Jim Kirkpatrick mode of travel... chain ferry – just to to live here until he was two but my watch the chains pulling through the granny lived on the other side of the ““We all had done tattie howking, water and then the water drenching Clyde and my grandfather used to at tattie season, we used to go along from these huge large chains. work in the sewage works: he drove to Erskine Ferry and line up and a And of course as it got nearer the the engine there, the train. And my farmer would come across from the slipway the chains would tension granny was telling us one of the other side of the river and pick his 25 boys, going across on the ferry first picnic – that was a great place for thing in the morning and you got Sunday school trips, not for our taken out to the fields and you lifted church but a lot of Sunday school potatoes, got taken to the family trips used to go there and there was yard at lunchtime and you could boil a bit of beach and then there was potatoes and milk and back. Then beach further along. We all used they brought you back to the ferry at to play in the water but when we 5 o’clock, all for the princely sum of got home we were covered in oil 2 shilling and a sixpence per day. because the ships were still going up and down, the shipyards were OIL IN THE RIVER busy, and there was oil and you had Lucinda McGinty oil on your feet and oil on your legs ““I don’t know whether it was a and you had to get scrubbed. It was halfpenny or a penny, you went a nicer beach but when you went in Photo courtesy of SCRAN across on the ferry and it was a the water it was still oily. © Scottish Life Archive

The ferry was fascinating, it was like going to another world, not because Erskine and the countryside on the other side of the river was really different, but it just seemed to have a mystery to it since we could only look at it and not touch it. Photo courtesy of Douglass Montgomery Photo courtesy of SCRAN 26 © Bob Pritchard The Clyde was originally a shallow river which could be forded at low tides and was strategically important to the Romans, who placed stepping stones to make crossings easier. In the 1770s a deep channel was cut to allow bigger vessels upstream to Glasgow.

A slipway for the new ferry was constructed which commenced operation in 1777. Initially the ferry was a punt. From 1832 to 1860 it was a hand-pulled chain and 1860 saw the first steam powered ferry boat.

Until 1904 it was maintained by Lord Blantyre when Clyde Navigation trust took over.

The Erskine Bridge opened in 1971 and the ferry ceased at midnight on 2nd July that year.

Photo courtesy of West Dunbartonshire Photo courtesy of West Dunbartonshire Council Libraries & Cultural Services Council Libraries & Cultural Services 27

Photo courtesy of SCRAN © The Scotsman Publications Ltd 28

THE AURORA LAMP SCOUT HALL FACTORY The Aurora Lamp Factory was THE BUILDING don’t realise that the Scout Hall was established in Old Kilpatrick in Owen Sayers a petrol station. Obviously there 1932. Old maps show that it was ““Originally, that building [the were a lot of cars passing back and adjacent to the Gentles canteen current Scout Hall] was owned by forwards from the ferry and if the which is now the Scout Hall. It two sisters, the Gentles, and it was queues were long and people were was ’s first electric bulb Jennie Gentle’s café for… no, Jennie running low on fuel, obviously the manufacturer, from 1932 to the Gentles’ tearoom for something petrol station paid. After the bridge mid 1950s. It was claimed that ladies or something like that… they was opened, there wasn’t point in a the bulbs lasted for 15 years, used to have little tea dances in the petrol station being there. due to the high quality filaments hall at the back and there was like that were used. The factory was DROPPED KERB important to the war effort during a tearoom café downstairs. But, Owen Sayers they had given it up and it had been WWII. In March 1941, it suffered taken over by a carpentry business ““When the carpenters moved out damage at the hands of the enemy and they’d used the front part as of the Scout Hall it was taken over during the Blitz but recovered offices and the back part had all the by a small firm that had it as a petrol 80% production within 7 months. machinery for the woodworking that garage for cars going down to the Eventually, it lost trade to cheap they did. So, that was all away when ferry to fill up. And if you look at imports that, unfortunately, only we [the Scouts] were offered this. the land going down the road there lasted a fraction of the time. One The house was used by the people you’ll see that the kerb was dropped memory puts its closure date at building the bridge so the idea was in two places so cars could come in 1956. that when the bridge was finished and out or if they were coming off they would give us the house in the ferry they could come in and out. As we grew up, into our payment for the land and the house TABLET AND CAKES teens, believe it or not [my that belonged to the Scout group. Owen Sayers mother] got a job at the [It] wasn’t fit for purpose so they Aurora Lamp Works down eventually agreed to demolish the ““I remember it was a great source hall and put up a Marley building for of income to the Scout Group when Ferry Road. And My Dad us which was fine but the Marley we moved in in 1968. I used to make wasn’t very pleased when building wasn’t attached to the hall tablet about two or three nights a so I then negotiated with them to put week, all sorts of different tablet she told him that she was a connecting part between the hall and ladies would bake cakes and going to get a job. She said and the house which is still there. we’d go down… because there were “well, a wee bit of extra big queues for the ferry that used to THE PETROL STATION stretch right through the village… and money won’t go amiss so Ken Miller we used to go out and sell tablet and I’m taking the job”. ““The Shell petrol station. It was cakes to the waiting people, waiting their white suits/coats with the to go on the ferry. It was a great Shell motif on them. Most people source of income for many years. Anne Alexander 29 OLD TRAIN STATION THE OLD STATION into your bucket and that kept your train crossing the swing bridge at Steve Woods fire burning till you got your man’s Bowling Harbour. It was probably in ““It was just on the other side wages. the early 50s – I don’t know when it of the canal: so you have Roman actually closed; but I remember the STEAM TRAINS low level station still being open. Crescent, the canal and then the old Jim McCall railway track. I remember it but don’t Beeching closed it – so it’d be in have any strong memories of it. I ““Well, obviously we could see the early 60s. We took them for remember going with Gordon and the steam train: we heard it before granted – you would hear the train. his family and with my own family you saw it, belching out steam. The I remember getting on to the third occasionally to Helensburgh and we most marked instance was when class carriage and it belching out would have gone on the old railway. I the swing bridge would open to let smoke. And then you got the advent do remember being in Old Kilpatrick the canal traffic through underneath of the electric train and that was Railway Station which was the it. But I do recollect seeing the quite a change. one down Ferry Road, I remember boarding the train there, but also Photo courtesy of SCRAN because the lady who ran the ticket © Historic Environment Scotland office or the station was a lady called Mary Hoy who was a close friend of my mother, so we used to go down there and see her... I have a clear memory of the railway station and the trains going up and down but it would have been a rare treat for us to have gone on the train.

COAL FOR YOUR FIRE Maggie Larkin My mother in law told me stories about when the railway was down the bottom so you had the two railway lines when you were a bit hard up at the end of the week for coal for the fire, if you went down when the train was passing and held your bucket up the guys would give you a shovel of coal off the train 30 BARCLAY CHURCH

THE CHURCH falling because of the storm. [Can John Hood you remember it?] Well, actually I The Barclay church was on ““The old Barclay Church was slept right through it, actually, that’s the corner of Main Street and demolished in 1933 as it was in poor what my mother said ‘never seen Barclay Street, with the manse condition and replaced with a new anybody sleep through anything like behind. building opened in December 1936. that in my life.’ They were terrified, It was originally built in Gothic It was subsequently blitz damaged, they were up and I slept through the style and was initially called the closed and re-opened in 1944. It whole lot of it and it was when I got Old Kilpatrick Free Church, but was that church that I attended up the next morning to go to school after the death of the minister although I was not there when it was that I saw all the devastation and all Matthew Barclay in 1865, the damaged in the 1968 gale and never the trees lying and I said ‘oh, what church was renamed after him. re-opened. At that time we also used happened?’ the old Mission Hall for Sunday THE DESTRUCTION WAS It was replaced with a new school purposes and social events. TERRIBLE church in 1936 which was then When the second church blew down Myra Mackenzie damaged by the gales of 1968 this building was substantially and demolished. A block of flats But see the next day [after the improved to act as a temporary ““ was built in its place. church. storm] when we got up, see the destruction! There was trees down, THE GREAT STORM roofs blown off. See when I saw Rona Mirren the church, I could not believe it, ““When we stayed in the glen the whole church collapsed. I mean When I saw the there was a storm, it must have the destruction was terrible. But we been maybe about between 1964 had a few broken panes, you know. I church, I could maybe about 1966 - 68 and the think the wind was throwing things. Barclay church got blown down. So, we all just sat in the living room not believe it, the The Barclay church, the one where away back from the windows, played whole church there are houses now. And we music and that because I didn’t want stayed in the glen at that point and to frighten the kids and played at collapsed. I mean the trees were falling around about silly games to take their minds off it. us and thankfully we never got hit I can remember that night as though the destruction but they were close. But they were it was yesterday. Horrendous night. really close when the trees were was terrible. 31

Top: original Barclay Church (named after Revd Matthew Barclay, built in 1843)

Right: Barclay Church in the 1960s

Photos courtesy of West Dunbartonshire Council Libraries & Cultural Services

The Blantyre Hall stood at the end of the glen and was later renamed to the Barclay Hall (photo courtesy of Douglass Montgomery) 32MEMORIES OF THE BLITZ

ANDERSON SHELTER you saw them, you know the moon on fire... but they let the oil out. I Anne Alexander was shining and you could see them don’t know if it was deliberate or by ““On the first night of the Blitz, when in formation coming up the Clyde and accident so therefore it ruined the the siren went and, you know, you obviously heading for the factories, bank at this side, all the oil gathered; heard some gunfire, we went under the shipyards, in Clydebank and the but that was another thing: families the table in the kitchen basically and oil tanks at Dalnottar. went down on to the shore at this side too before the Blitz happened, then it got more fierce and my Dad THEY MISTOOK THE BOULEVARD went out and went up Stuart Street because the sand was lovely right all FOR THE CLYDE the way down to Bowling, but then into the pen and we all went there for Carol Cummings a wee while but my Dad was getting the oil got on to the sand... a bit twitchy because he thought if ““I remember one of the times my Dad said ‘we’ll just sit in the THE MOSAIC AT THE FERRY there was a direct hit on the building Elma Robertson above an awful lot of folk would be hall, close the doors and we’ll sit crushed. So, he decided at that point in the hall, we’ll be quite safe here.’ ““…and that’s one thing I remember to take us along to my Grannie Hay’s The wardens came and put us out. about the Blitz. My youngest aunt Anderson shelter and of course it And there was a big shelter in the took me after the Blitz, it would have was, there was water, four or five park [at the top of Stuart Avenue] been a few days after it, and we went inches of water in the Anderson for everybody and we were running down the Ferry Road and the waiting shelter at that point but at least there down there and God I can see it yet room had been on fire and I was was some more protection. – the tracer bullets and the bombs intrigued by the fact that it was one dropping – I was terrified. That was of those pedestal weighing machines Dalnottar Terrace wasn’t damaged because my Dad said we’d be fine with all the little mosaic tiles on the despite the fact that, you know, the just stay in the house but they put us base of it and I was fascinated by the second night of the blitz my Mum out… and at the end of the avenue fact that the heat had made a few and Dad and Fay and me joined there was a field with swings in it and of these pop out and they were lying the rest of the Hay family in their the shelter was down there, it was a on the floor, the wee squares, the Anderson shelter; because the men great big shelter… And if the Germans mosaic squares I always remember had spent the time they had the day hadn’t mistook the Boulevard for the that. before, before the Blitz, before the Clyde we wouldn’t be here. They were aiming for all the tanks, the oil tanks BOMBS ON THE BOULEVARD planes started to come over, and Ken Miller they’d taken all the water out of the and it was a lovely bright night and Anderson shelter because it hadn’t they mistook the Boulevard for the ““I can also tell you one story about been used up until then. And so the Clyde. the night of the Blitz, [the gentleman whole lot of us were squeezed into who lived here] with his father at OIL TANKS that point. He had his wife and his the Anderson shelter. June Alderdice two boys, so the five of them were in I can’t remember whether it was the ““During the Blitz the night that the this house the night of the Blitz and first night or the second night, I’ve got tanks got... I know there was one a bomb went off on the Boulevard a feeling it was the second night, but tank got bombed anyway for it was directly behind the house. It blew out 33 the back windows and it blew down, for targeting purposes. Indeed, one for a while; and I was christened the blast blew down the centre wall of the houses round the corner there. Then we went back – I don’t between the back sitting room and from Admiralty House and the Chief remember the house being bombed the front lounge. Then the crater Engineer, a guy called MacKay, a but it was all fixed up. Nobody had that the bomb had left on the road bomb went down through the roof any furniture and it was all bits and up there, a bus full of nurses came of their house and landed in the bath pieces. It was a room and kitchen, along and went in the hole and it’s but didn’t explode. as we called it. It was safe to go because they didn’t have headlights back. or anything, because of the blackout. THE EVACUATION They were being transferred from Lucinda McGinty AN UNEXPLODED BOMB Tom Morrison one hospital to another. ““My mother went to with me wrapped in a blanket; she’d her ““This must have been, say, in BOMB IN THE BATH nightdress on and her fur coat and 1975, and I’m in an office across Owen Sayers a pair of slippers, and the Air Raid the road in the workshops, and one ““Well, the houses were built prior Warden had come up to get her out of the chaps come in and he says to the war obviously and it was only because I was only 3 month old at “I’ve got a wee boy here he says he’s when the war happened that the the Clydebank Blitz. found a bomb”. This wee lad came area was deemed to be a potential out – he was maybe about ten or target; and it was targeted. There’s I think nearly all the women had fur eleven, something like that. And an aerial photograph of this area of coats then – this big musquash I said “Where have you seen this the oil tanks taken by the Germans coat with a great big collar, I always bomb, son?” and he said “It’s on the remember it; and road up to the boulevard” I said “Up she was going to the the private road?” And he said “yes” air raid shelter and I said "climb into this Landrover”. So she looked back – we got into the Landrover and we the bombers were drove up the road. Just before we got coming across – and to the old bridge above the railway she looked back, he says “there - it’s there on the right she says... it was hand side”. And there was this big an incendiary went bomb sticking out the earth, with the through the roof so fins and everything on it! And I said all the furniture was “right son, okay” and I came down the going up in the air and road, and got a couple of our chaps she lost everything. I to block the bottom of the road so was wrapped in this nobody could come up, and I phoned blanket. the local police at Clydebank and said “look this is the oil fuel depot. Then she went to We have a bomb, we need the bomb Dunoon because my disposal people” and they did come uncle stayed there. up and they did remove the bomb. I We stayed with them believe the young lad got a citation.

Photo courtesy of SCRAN © Historic Environment Scotland 34 UNDER THE BRIDGE

RIBBONS FOR YOUR HAIR and then when I didn’t live in the in money and we would have it Carol Mackenzie village but I used to come and visit delivered by a security company, ““There was a wee Co-operative my friends, we’d come down and whereas the big ones like Clydebank and there was a fish mongers and we’d go into the café. It was old – all the shops pay in to them and you would go to the Co-operative fashioned style booths. You’d go they’ve got money all the time. and it had old fashioned drawers, in and on the left-hand side were wooden drawers with glass panels all the booths, red booths, with the And occasionally things would at the front and they would pull them counter at the right hand side. And happen – the van wouldn’t turn up out and you used to go there and you would buy things and meet your on time or whatever and I had seen buy ribbons for your hair, because I friends in there. going out and going up to Davie had long hair and you’d buy ribbons Graham’s and saying: “can you lend THE CHAPEL me three or four hundred quid and for your hair for school. And you Steve Woods would get your school uniform and I will give it back to you when the that’s where you got your school ““I was in my late teens, 17 or van comes” and they would just uniform for Gavinburn. It was like a 18, when they started digging the unhesitatingly say: “there you are, tie and different things if you bought foundations of the bridge. I don’t Eddie”, [they would] just give you stuff for school. This was mainly clearly remember the early part three or four hundred quid. It was the seventies I would say. And at the of the construction... except my quite a lot of money just to hand corner there was fishmongers with parents were quite excited because out to somebody. But they all knew a window but now it’s a flat. And the the Chapel had been able to sell me and they knew I wasn’t going to Co-operative is a flat. There was a some ground that they had. The scoodle off with it or anything like hairdresser’s there which is now still Catholic Church in those days was that. a hairdresser’s. It’s changed hands a a wooden hut, and they were quite excited because the selling of some POST OFFICE HOLD UP few times but that was there as well Eddie McDade it’s still there. ground for the construction of the bridge enabled them to start a ““We were held up... I got a LAZZERINI’S building fund which resulted some certificate from the Post Office for Carol Mackenzie years later when they had enough my bravery – for hiding behind the I went in to Lazzerini’s as it was. money to build a proper church. counter! A guy with a gun and a ““ guy with a knife come in and tried They had good ice cream. My friend POST OFFICE FUNDED BY DAVIE she always used to get sent on a to rob us. What happened was they GRAHAM come out and run up the glen, and Sunday for her Mum. She stayed on Eddie McDade Dalnottar Hill Road and she would one of our customers who didn’t live come through the Glen to get ice ““It was different times because in the village, at that time he had cream on a Sunday and then she there was odd occasions when a four-wheeled drive Jeep which would go back up. I did go in when things would happen. Our post office was a rarity at that time – he’d seen I was younger, when I was wee, being small wasn’t self-sufficient them coming running out with boiler 35 ADMIRALTY & FREELANDS suits on and he thought “what are though “oh”. They left the car and they doing?” And when they ran up, just went away. And a minute later OIL TANKS he slowly followed them up and he there was police everywhere, so Jim McCall seen them getting into a parked car she went out and says: “ooh what’s up Glen Road – there was another happened?” It was the talk of the ““The other area you had the guy waiting in a car up Glen Road village for a long time after that. It Admiralty at Old Kilpatrick for the with a mobile phone which was a was an experience; but it doesn’t fuel depot, and they had an admin rarity in those days as well – and seem to have affected me; I mean building; we called it the Admiralty. he phoned the police. They got the the guy who pointed the gun – I It was Government owned and car over where Dalnottar House found out later on it was loaded – it obviously there were these huge used to be – they parked it in there. was a real gun. But he didn’t even fuel tanks, they were part of the And another lady, she was standing get to say 'hand over the money' war effort and they were heavily dusting at the windows she seen because when I saw it, I grabbed camouflaged. Some of them were these three guys getting out and Elsie and got her on the floor. still a pretty dominant feature of taking their clothes off – they were the landscape above Old Kilpatrick taking their boiler suits off, and she – all the new housing estate is built where the fuel depot was.

THE ROUNDABOUT June Alderdice ““With building the new estate at the end where Freelands is, it was surprising that Old Kilpatrick has got a roundabout because older people like me’ll think “Oh my goodness, straight road through” but a roundabout at the end of Old Kilpatrick! I thought that was quite something!

Aerial view of Old Kilpatrick with oil tanks (photo courtesy of NCAP, © HES) 36 THE ETTRICK & THE SHOPS TOUR OF THE THREE LOCHS Billy Forsyth ““On occasion, we would go down to The Ettrick, and The Telstar, and The Glen Lusset (or the Grapes, as it was called)… we used to say, if we were going to the three pubs, that we were “going on a tour of the three lochs”.

THE TENEMENT Kenny McKenzie ““[The Ettrick] was actually a tenement with the public house commanding the breadth of the ground floor. So there was doors at either side of the bar… and there was ongoing works if I remember correctly and the pub didn’t close whilst the conversion was ongoing but the tenement above Photo courtesy of Stuart McMillan was systematically removed and then the architects got into it and sculpted the shape of it as it is today. I always think that the lower half is underneath the façade… it will still be the original tenement to some extent.

Photo courtesy of Douglass Montgomery 37

PIRIE THE CHEMIST time, when my Grandad was in at the Clydebank Fair had started. In Irene Howorth first you used to pull teeth. During those days the pubs shut at half two ““I started when I was 15. It still the war, you used to make stain and they’d come in and get all their had the big, old, long wooden for your legs because you couldn’t summer stuff. It was great. I used to counter with the glass cases afford, there was no nylons and love it. underneath it and the old drawers stuff like that. It was busy enough for two full timers on the counter. HAM AND EGG BUSINESS with all the names on it. That’s the Florence Boyle old scales out the chemists, see In those days folk would come the brass scales. We used to use in every week. Nowadays you go ““My great grandfather had a them but latterly we couldn’t use, to the supermarket and you buy ham and egg business and he had weren’t allowed to use them, them everything, but in those days you delivery in the village and owned because the weights weren’t right came into the chemists and you property I think, where the shops and you couldn’t clean them when got your toilet paper, your paper are now, at Thistleneuk, because you used them. When it was busy hankies, everything like that. And in the census it’s referred to as you got to know everybody. In those I always remember the Clydebank McLaughlin’s land and that was my days the dispensing was really the Fair because everybody came in. family’s name. And I heard stories of old type dispensing. You know, you "Oh, we’re going away our holidays” them… had a bit of a pony and trap, had to make up ointments, make up and they all got their stuff. They used to deliver out to places like powders for headaches, make up would stop early and would go into Lenzie and all these places. everything and I believe, before my one of the pubs for a drink because

A set of scales from Pirie's chemist (photo courtesy of Irene Howorth, nee Pirie) 38 Gala days and celebrations in the village (photos courtesy of Elma Robertson and Isobel Plunkett) 39 THE COMMUNITY THE CORONATION GALA stay in the village that were brought THE GALA DAYS Jim McCall up in the village or they come back David Stormonth ““There was a Gala date, the to it to send their children to the ““Billy Connolly even opened the Coronation, all the kids got dressed school there as well. They maybe first Gala day in the village. At that up – it was a big fancy dress don’t live in the village but they still time he was an up and coming star, parade. I was dressed as a jockey send their children to the school. with the yellow banana boots on, – jodhpurs, jockey hat, and we MITCHELL TERRACE PARTY and he was there all day, talking to were taken to the High Lusset and Jim Dunbar people and joking. That happened we paraded round there, it was a once a year. There was a whole gala beautiful sunny day, it was too hot ““I have a vague memory, at the week everybody would get involved but there were some spectacular end of the war there was a sort the Boys Brigade, the churches, costumes. And we were given a of a street sort of thing at night the Girls Brigade, the Scouts, the coronation mug (which I still have) along where Mitchell Terrace was football teams – everybody got and a chocolate crown – that was a – roughly where the old folks home involved in the whole village. big treat, a chocolate crown! is now - and they had it out there, Armstrong’s shop was the other side The houses were festooned with and the petrol station. The party was Myra Mackenzie bunting – lots of people had when I was about seven or eight ““The Queen came over [to launch coloured lights, photographs, and running about and crackers the ship]. So, we all went over. So, pictures of the Queen with lighted going off and fireworks… it would she was coming over this side to bulbs round them, and we had be VE day, I think… that was a very go and launch the boat. Princess communal parties for the children memorable event to me. Of course, Anne was there as well and Charles. and all the neighbours put all their there wasn’t that much traffic about Anyway, she came off the ferry. tables laid out in the back garden those days and the whole street just She was in a big limousine. My with sandwiches and cake and stopped because of that. That was a Mum was there an’aw and we had lemonade. very memorable night to me, at that all these wee Union Jacks and age up so late, running up! There she was as close as I was to you. HAPPY TIMES was dancing, people were dancing But see when [the ship] made its Carol Mackenzie on the street. maiden voyage down, the whole of ““I remember the gala days as DRESSING UP Gavinburn School came out, down well….they used to have the [gala] Evelyn Campbell Portpatrick Road, and I do not know days and things like that in the how that [made it]. It took the whole school, sorry, in the village. Nice gala ““At the Coronation, one of the width of the Clyde and you could days. Just happy times. A nice place girls dressed up as the Queen and actually have went like that and to grow up, Old Kilpatrick, people we dressed up as train bearers and think you could touch it. I’d never were friendly, people knew each paraded round the area (to celebrate saw a ship that size in my life. other as well. A lot of people still the coronation). 40 AUDIO WALK 2 This walk starts in the village centre and takes the walker along Dumbarton Road in the opposite direction to Audio walk 1, towards the bridge, through the Lusset Glen and round the Lusset park, through A82 Kilpatrick train station, down Station Road and back to the start at the village shops. 5 The walk is about a mile long and the route is indicated here. The recording START HERE can be paused and restarted to fit with your walking speed.

The points marked on the map give an indication of the topics you can read 6 4 about in this booklet and hear in the recording. Station Road Dumbarton Road

3 The audio walk recording can be downloaded from www. awalkthroughthepast.org.uk as an mp3 file and can be played on any 1 smartpone, tablet or mp3 player. 2 Glen Lusset

F o r t h

a n d

C l y d e

C a n a A898 Erskine Bridge l

1. Glen Cafe and Glen Lusset 2. Lusset Glen 3. High/Lusset Park 4. The railway 5. 6. Station Road 41 GLEN CAFE & GLEN LUSSET

THE GRAPES RIGHT, AWAY YOUS GO! wasn’t children friendly. But we used Owen Sayers Lucinda McGinty to go and get a lovely, you know, ““Well, the Lusset was the Grapes. ““We all used to sit in there when fancy ice cream dishes and we’d Where the car park is there was a big we were about sixteen on a Sunday get raspberry on our ice cream. The red sandstone tenement there and night; sometimes we only had ice cream, I think it was his Dad’s the Grapes pub was on the ground enough for one drink between us all or his Uncle’s recipe. It was a well floor of that and if you went round – a hot orange drink and we would kept secret. It really was lovely ice to the other side of that tenement all pass it round maybe about three cream. And I can remember, used on the ground floor was Andy Capps of us were having a sip each of this to have the loveliest, at Easter time, [who] had his barber shop and then hot orange and then Bertie would lovely big Easter eggs in boxes. And if you went round the back of that get ratty because we were just then at Christmas lovely boxes of building there were stairs that went buying one drink between four of us. chocolates. My Dad would go and up to the houses and there was a There was no coffees – not anybody buy us a lovely big Easter egg or cobblers in there and that was a Mr drank coffee then, it was hot orange for my Mum a beautiful, big, fancy Apps. So you had Capps the barber or lemonade or if you were rich you box of chocolates. It was all out of and Apps the cobbler. had an iced drink. And that’s where Bertie’s. we spent our Sunday nights in there, ANY GUM, CHUM? down at the Glen Cafe and then Sheena Johnston he would throw us all out at eight ““I’ve always had a thing for o’clock “RIGHT, away yous go!” and Bertie Lazzerini, who owned chewing gum. And the other we’d all have go to. Well that’s when the Glen Cafe was the son of memory I’ve got is sitting on the wall he shut – at eight o’clock. Torello and Quintilla Lazzerini. where the cenotaph is and there When WWI broke out, Torello would be boats in with sailors, like ALL OUT OF BERTIE’S Irene Howorth returned to Italy to join up. He American sailors coming off into the was killed in action in 1917 village, and we would say “any gum In the door, counter was on the ““ leaving a widow Quintilla and a chum?” because I was so dead keen right hand side and on the left hand young son Bertie. to get chewing gum. side there were like bench seats and I’m sure there was a jukebox Bertie later owned and ran POKEY HATS at one point. But Bertie, oh he was Irene Howorth the Glen Café for many years, a bad-tempered man. One time, it directly across the road from ““We’d go into the café, Bertie was a rainy day, and the cafe had the memorial where his father Lazzerini, and get a pokey hat and steamed up, the windows, and I is remembered. a bar of Caramac. That was our rubbed the windows and he shouted Sunday treat. A pokey hat, you don’t “I’ve just cleaned those windows. hear that nowadays, sure you don’t. What do you think you’re doing?” He 42 LUSSET GLEN

MOTORWAYS CUT A LOT OF THE in those days, a bottle of lemonade that time. It was heavily wooded GOOD BITS AWAY and my mother would make us a with very very old trees at that time. George Mirren piece and jam and that was a picnic, you know, there was a group of us. GREAT PLACE TO GO AND JUST ““The Glen itself, as I would say… all PLAY these motorways coming in they cut a REALLY, REALLY GOOD FUN June Alderdice lot of the good bits away, if you know Irene Howorth what I mean, and they put all these ““There was a Mr Sanny Bell, he cement buildings and frameworks up, ““Just playing in the burn and lived in the wee cottage, the Station you know. Because on the Boulevard having great fun. I think there used Road end, and I think he was in there, as you passed Dalnottar coming to be an old paddling pool but it was charge of the men that kept the glen down the way, going Dumbarton way, done away with years ago. And just in good condition. The burn was you had that wee road that took you really having great fun and being lovely: clear and natural and it was a into Station Road here, you never had away from the house. Even though great place to go and just play – you need for these big walls on the sides, it was just along the road but we know, run around the trees. My Mum that was all done to hold the bankings could have freedom and nobody had took us as well for quite a spell for a up because of the motorways and to bother about, you know, you just wee picnic you know – it was lovely. different things, you see. went out and played. We played hide and seek with the trees and built EVERYBODY USED TO GO IN ALWAYS UP THE GLEN wee dens. It was great; it was really, THERE Elma Robertson really good fun. Myra Mackenzie There used to be a wee pool ““We played up the glen, we were FAVOURITE SPOT WITH THE OLD ““ always up the glen, there used in there at one time and we used KILPATRICK KIDS to take them up there in their wee to be swings in the glen and the Jim McCall maypole and there was a paddling trunks and they’d have a wee swim. pool but we weren’t allowed to go ““We had a paddling pool in the That was a lovely place believe it in it because bad boys were always glen. It was a fair sizeable pool. The or not at one time. Although it was throwing bottles into it and there glen was a favourite spot certainly in quite shaded you know with all was broken glass in the paddling good weather. We had the Glen Cafe the trees but it was a lovely, lovely pool… that was on the left as you go that’s still there. It was Lazzerini – place to take them. I’d forgot about up through the glen and across the Italian people who had it. There was that. Everybody used to go in there little bridge – along that side was the mother, Bertie Lazzerini – they and take wee picnics. The squirrels the paddling pool. I don’t know if the had it for a couple of generations. used to come down and you’d take remnants are still there – and then We would get an ice cream and go stuff for them. The rabbits would be we used to play at jumping the burn in to the glen and have a paddle. It running about. That was really good and we were always having picnics was a favourite spot with the Old up there. Kilpatrick kids. Good memories of 43

Photo courtesy of Robert Fleming 44

Paddling pool in Lusset Glen (photo courtesy of Robert Fleming) 45

THE PADDLING POOL ever be filled. There’s maybe two THE GHOST IN THE GLEN Owen Sayers occasions I can remember in my David Stormonth ““But the glen itself was a place life that we actually went down and ““As a young boy we weren’t really that you played in constantly. The were able to paddle in it. We used allowed along the glen. I always paddling pool was open in the to paddle in the burn, then climb the remember stories of the school – summer. It was drained in the winter. trees at the burn as well. they used to say that there was an But it used to be full in the hot SANNY BELL old lady, a ghost, in the glen burn, weather, you know, and we seemed Elma Robertson just at the wee bridge. Did anybody to get more hot weather in those believe it or not? I think there was days. ““Before you come to the railway a few youngsters believed it; down tunnels you go across that little in the dark in the glen, because it COTTAGE IN THE GLEN bridge and you walked back a bit was very dark. We used to go along George Mirren and there was a roundabout there, as a school – we did some nature ““Well, it’s all changed now but at there was a maypole and there were things through the glen: we would the top entrance, my wife’s family swings all round about there and I walk up through the glen and take [Cairney], her father had the house wouldn’t be surprised if there are still the leaves off the trees and go back there, it was a wee cottage and the remnants. One man looked after the for a nature project; people from burn ran down the other side, there glen and he lived in that house and that end of the village would tell you was a wee road went through and he had at the other side of the burn the ghost stories that they’d heard on the other side there was the burn a big patch of ground where he had about from their older brothers or and a bridge and it was like… he gooseberry bushes and a market whatever... They used to try and see grew the vegetables there, her father garden practically. Sanny Bell was if you could see the ghost. Nobody and some of the men in the park his name, again, he was friendly with ever seen it though. used to go in and dig in the winter my mother and father and the family and get it all ready. And then the and we used to get gooseberries ...we could have glen, as I say it’s all changed now… when they were in season when we just as you come down Station Road went up that way. He looked after freedom and nobody just before you go round the corner the glen and it was in better nick into Station Road well there was an with one man looking after it with a had to bother about, entrance there that took you up into scythe and you daren’t misbehave if you know, you just the glen up to the hall, there was a he was around because you could road up there, a dirt road up there. get told off. The same in the village went out and played. here if the village policeman saw A BIT OF A DISAPPOINTMENT you and knew you… there were a We played hide and Billy Forsyth few tearaways in the village and he would say to them ‘right, I know who seek with the trees The paddling pool was always ““ you are and I’m going to have a word a bit of a disappointment… it was with your father or mother', whatever and built wee dens. hardly ever filled with water, no the case would be and nobody matter what happened… we would It was great; it was would come back at him with ‘you’re always go down there hoping it picking on my boy'. would be filled... but it would never really, really good fun. 46 LUSSET PARK TENNIS AND CURLING BESIDE THE RAILWAY the big Lusset Hall there, a big thing, Ken Miller George Mirren that was our bothy and we had a ““Beside the bowling green, tennis ““See where the bowling green is, couple of huts where we kept our courts were there. When you say well along there, there was a couple machinery. curling rink everybody imagines a of tennis courts there, this was just THE SWING PARK building with an ice rink inside it beside the railway, it was just off… Rona Mirren which couldn’t be further from the the railway was on the one side and truth. It was concrete and it was then you had the path and you had ““We used to play at tennis and the full length of an ice [rink] and it two tennis courts there… well that cricket and we used to go up the had little walls so that water could football pitch was turned because park because there was still the old be contained and then when it froze of the roads, it run the opposite swing-park stuff: the big witches’ they had a curling rink. And it ran way, because of that they had to hat, the big rocking horse and the parallel with the railway line along turn the park because of the likes of swings, we used to go up there. That towards the bridge and the tennis maybe a football hitting a car and was at the other end of the glen near courts did similar. causing an accident. And you had the railway station but on the left hand side, like at the end of the park, see how the bowling green is there and the other end of the park well The opening of the bowling green that’s where the swing park was, we (photo courtesy of Robert Fleming) played up there.

THE HALL Rona Mirren ““There was a hall up at the top of the glen where the changing rooms are just now for the football teams, there was a big hall there. The Chapel used to run the Boys Guild from there and we always had the keys so they had to come to us, they had to come down the banking to get the key from us to open the hall and there always had to be somebody there because the Council let the hall out to the Sunday school picnics and they had groups of youngsters came and they had fun up there and they used the hall for their picnic and things like that. 47

THE PLAY GROUNDS Billy Forsyth The Old Kilpatrick High Park was actually quite good… The Lusset Hall and we also had, although I never played there, the tennis courts, and the bowling green, and they were quite quality places in their own right, at that particular time. They were quite a good standard, the play grounds and all that, above the glen and the High Park... all good entertainment for children.

DANCES Billy Forsyth We used to go to dances in the Lusset Hall, that actually had groups. They’d have dances up there... Probably, I’d have been about fourteen at the time…we’d go up to the dances and various gangs would be up there as well. We never really had any bother with anyone… everyone just understood what the code was.

The north part of Lusset Glen was turned into the slip roads from the bridge onto the A82. Young Elma, her mother and her (photos courtesy of Douglass Montgomery) grandfather with sister looking down at the village from the boulevard (A82) (photo courtesy of Elma Robertson) 48 THE RAILWAY

THE TICKET OFFICE THE BLUE TRAINS was also a back room whereby Carol Mackenzie Billy Forsyth the coal was kept because it was ““Sometimes, if people came to When I was at school, at Gavinburn coal fires. It was quite an ordeal for visit us, we would go up to the train school, the blue trains, as they were me to be lighting a fire every day, station, up at the back beside the called then, the electric train, the I hadn’t been used to that. But the bowling green, and you’d go and line was just getting electrified. I local shopkeeper knew what it was meet people off the train. It was think that must have been about like in the station and would kindly different then because the train 1958 or something like that. So give me a box of fire lighters every office was open and you would go in before that, trains weren’t really a day, I took up my newspapers, got and, I’m sure it had a coal fire, it was factor in travelling, you know, from the fire lit, got quite used to it. But quite old fashioned, Victorian, and Old Kilpatrick into Glasgow. It was Kilpatrick was also awarded on you would go in there then all the always by bus, nobody had a car. numerous occasions the best kept tickets were laid out in front of the That was the thing then, children station because previous employees person that was selling tickets. Like had a lot of freedom and scope to liked to put up plants and flowers all the different tickets labelled with be able to go lots of places. There etc and I carried on that tradition at destinations, so you had that. were no cars ever to bother you, Old Kilpatrick, and we were lucky because nobody had a car. There enough to win some prizes. THE WAITING ROOM was only one car in our end of Owen Sayers THE BIG FREEZE Dalnottar Road, and that was the Maureen MacKeever ““The waiting room… if you took man’s who lived next door to us. the building as a whole the bit ““I know when I started at nearest the Station Road that was RAILWAY WOMEN Kilpatrick station, I was only there a Maureen MacKeever the ticket office and the ticket office couple of years when they had the had a window that came out onto ““The railway were being coaxed big freeze, there was no trains at all the platform but if that was closed into employing more women and for weeks but we still had to make you could go inside and there was I was only the second woman on our way and the whole of Station another glass window for getting the line between Helensburgh and Road was just a total ice rink but your tickets at that. And then there Airdrie. So I started at Kilpatrick we still had to turn up for work. was the waiting room itself which, station in 1981 and I worked for 31 That must have been about 1984… if my memory serves me right, also years on the railway until I retired. I remember... I mean the stillness! had a coal fire in it which was lit in Kilpatrick station was quite unique The trees were frozen, everything the winter. But it was well used. because it had arched windows. was just frozen and wasn’t a breath It had a big waiting room, there of wind and that lasted for weeks. 49 KILPATRICK HILLS

A POPULAR PASTIME up on a Sunday, not as far as Loch John Hood Humphrey but my father and my ““Heading up into the Kilpatricks uncle, his brother, and his kids and was a very popular pastime, whether us would go up the hills and past the building gang huts in Scott’s wood, Haw Craig and under the cliff where climbing the crags, fishing for you go to Loch Humphrey. There tadpoles in the many bomb craters, was a troch there and my uncle used or heading for Loch Humphrey to get to call it the Brandy Well and we birds’ eggs. would walk to the Brandy Well and get a drink out of this troch... that OUR SUNDAY was about as far as we went and Irene Howorth even that has changed a bit from erosion because we used to get, And I remember when we got ““ we called them diamond stones, it bigger, about seven or eight, my Dad was quartz, there used to be a lot of used to take Dorothy and I a walk quartz and we'd always be looking every Sunday with our best coats for bits of quartz. My mother used to on, and we’d go up the glen, up the hate it because we had bits of them Rosie Road, and down, we’d come all over the house... We spent a lot through Filshie’s Farm, the horse, of time in the hills. When I was into Dobbin the horse and we’d feed it, my teens and when I was at high the horse on the Rosie Road, and school, a bunch of us would go up gather rosehips from, to take, I think but on a Sunday the family would the school used to take the rosehips have family walks up there. in, and we’d come down through

Filshie’s Farm and my Dad would I remember coming down from stand and talk to John Fishie, the high school and going up the Old father and the boys. It was good. Kilpatrick hills with a friend from That was our Sunday. high school, because we climbed BRANDY WELL down the crag under it, the Haw Elma Roberston Craig and she froze half way down. When I look at it know I think gee Once the Napiers went away, ““ wizz, we were bold right enough, no we were allowed to go up the wonder she froze but we managed Kilpatrick Hills with guides from Elma's mother and father with friends to get down to negotiate it, so you the Gavinburn farm and we were out for a walk up Kilpatrick Hills must've been allowed up then, after (photos courtesy of Elma Roberston) able to go up when my uncle was the war. the gamekeeper... We used to go 50 STATION ROAD THE BOOKIE THE GARAGE as it was called - Kate McArthur’s Jim McCall Maggie Larkin was her name but it was always ““The police station was then ““The pharmacy was across just called just Mac’s Bar. And then latterly bought by McGarrity the the road next to the Ettrick… you there was the bakery – Craig the bookmaker [...he] was quite a wouldn’t believe how many houses Bakers and then there was the Co- character – a respected, well-known they put in that space once they took op; Kate’s was there; then there was bookie. And he latterly developed the pharmacy away… unbelievable! the bakery, I think then there was the the old police station – he bought and there was a garage at the Co-op and there was a chip shop, the old police station, and he made bottom of Station Road with a big and there was a big house sat on the it into his own property basically and white house and pump to get your corner. Old Kilpatrick was’na the way he would keep his greyhounds in fuel from and that’s all these flats as it is now, you went straight along the the garden. Because he was an avid well now. road and then Station Road went up greyhound man; he would take them there but there was a big house sat training up the hills. He would train SHOPS AND PUBS there, and I believe that was the Post them on the hillside and you would Lucinda McGinty Office at one time – the Post Office used to be there. And then there was regularly see him out walking with And then Station Road, there ““ all the houses up Station Road. his greyhounds. was a pub – Mac’s Bar, or Kate’s

Remembrance parade (photo courtesy of Robert Fleming) 51

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS INTERVIEWEES Our thanks go to the following people and organisations who helped with the project: Heritage Lottery Fund Scottish Oral History Centre and David Walker June Anne Florence Evelyn Carol Jim Dunbar Alderdice Alexander Boyle Campbell Cummings West Dunbartonshire Council Libraries & Cultural Services, Clydebank Heritage Centre John Hood Edith Girvan The Twisted Thistle Action Old Kilpatrick Billy Forsyth Irene Sheena Jim Maggie Carol Howarth Johnston Kirkpatrick Larkin Mackenzie Thanks to all who kindly donated photographs: Elma Robertson, Robert Fleming, Heather Hay, Douglass Montgomery, Stuart McMillan, Irene Howorth, Alex Myra Kenny Jim McCall Eddie Lucinda Maureen Strachan, Alistair Douglas Mackenzie MacKenzie McDade McGinty McKeever

Interviewers: David Walker, Susanne Hall, Elizabeth Pitts, Isobel Plunkett, Debbie Keenan, Sarah Smith

Booklet, website design and Kenny Miller George Rona Mirren Tom Elma Owen Sayers admin support: Mirren Morrison Robertson Jana Moravcova

David Steve Woods Stormonth

Published by Action Old Kilpatrick with support from the Heritage Lottery Fund © 2018