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Recollections
11.
Robert Laird
Longstone, Edinburgh |
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Thank you to Robert Laird for writing again, this
time in response to Sheila Stewart's request (9 + 10 above) for more
information about the history of Slateford and Longstone.
Below are some extracts from notes about the area
written by Robert's dad who lived in Longstone from his birth in 1927
until 1962 when most of the houses between Inglis Green Road and Haugh
Park were flattened: |
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Haugh Park
"In Haugh Park you had folk like:
-
Betty Mair.
She is still there (2010) in the sheltered housing complex. Haugh
Park is all sheltered housing now.
- Archie and
Daisy McNab who lived above the chip shop.
Archie was my brother Robert's
best pal. They were great people.
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I also remember the
Welsh, Knox and Naughtman
Thorburn and Morris families and Ian Mitchell. They all lived in the
area.
- Tommy
Preston lived in Haugh Park. He went on to play
football for the Hibs. His father was called 'Stranger'.
I don’t know why. He used to
coach athletics, and he used to organize sprints up at Redhall Park and
things like that.
There was always something going on in the
village when I was a wee lad." |
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Opposite Gray's Mill
"Opposite Gray’s
Mill, which later on would be owned by Steeles,
there was:
- a yard shared by Weatherston the coal
man and Cowie the milkman. Later on a Mr Burroughs, a builder, took
over the yard.
- just beside Weatherston’s yard,
and stretching up to the top of Redhall was Pye’s Farm. The farm buildings
were on the land that became McNabs and the Inglis Green Laundry. It
was a big farm, the biggest in Longstone. They had barns and other
buildings it was a real farm, no' like the wee ones at Wester Hailes.
So from Weatherston’s yard to the lane leading
into Redhall Park, and right back to the top of Redhall where the primary
school is now, that was all Pye’s Farm." |
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Laundry
"The laundry and dry
cleaners were built pretty much an addition to the dye works that
were already on Inglis Green Road.
It was the two Stevenson
brothers who owned and ran them:
John ran the Dry Cleaners and Cyril ran the laundry.
They had the two big houses beside the footpath into the Redhall
Public Park.
We called it the 'Polly
Park'. When I was about ten I waited outside one of the Stevensons'
houses for a wedding party to set off for the church. All
the bairns gathered outside of house that someone
getting married left from, because there was always a 'poor
oot'.
Money was thrown out of the car windows and
the bairns scrambled around to get as much as they could.
Normally it was just coppers, pennies and
ha’pennies, but the poor oot from the Stevensons was all silver, half
crowns as well. I couldn’t believe it at the time." |
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Kingsknowe
"At the far end of
Longstone village, where Haugh Park finishes, there were farm fields.
Kingsknowe Road North takes you up to
Kingsknowe railway station.
It looked completely
different when I was a wee boy; it was all fields most of the way up." |
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Shops
"The Thomas
family had a shop just along from us, opposite the pub, and the
Frasers then took it over.
Mrs. Brand had a wee shop over the road beside
the Longstone Inn. She sold cakes and
things like that, as well as sweeties.
All
the shops had some sweeties, except Findlay's,
the bakers,, which was right over from the
school. That's a chip shop now, as you
know.
Mrs Brand's wee shop
used to be owned by the Forresters. Mrs
Harper rented it from them. She traded as
a bakers back then. When I was a youngster,
working in the laundry, I’d get stuff from her
each day and settle up on the Friday when I got paid. She
was a smashing woman, and lived in a house at the back or side of the shop
back then." |
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Sutherland's Shops
"It was Mr
Sutherland who owned just about all the shops in Longstone He had
the Wines and Grocers shop, where he worked,
opposite the Longstone Inn. Sandersons used to have
a wine shop there and he bought it off them.
When we were growing up,
Mr Sutherland would tease us.
His Grocer's shop was full of boxes with
everything in them from biscuits to sugar and tea. You’d tell him how much
you wanted, say, a quarter pound of sugar and
he’d weigh it out and put it in a brown bag; the
same with butter and cheese. He'd cut you
off a bit cheese or pat out a square of butter and wrap it up.
He had this trick where if your change was
just one coin he’d fool you into thinking it was under one hand when it
was in fact under the other one.
Next door to Sutherlands fruit & veg shop on
Redhall Gardens was his fishmongers. On the other side of the road from
the fishmongers he had two other shops, a
butcher’s that he sometimes worked in, and his first grocers shop, the one
he had before he bought Mrs Sutherlands. I
remember during the war how he was in all his shops at some time or other
during the week." |
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Kerr's Newsagents
"The shop on the
corner of Redhall Gardens and Longstone Road, that’s now a bookmakers,
used to be Kerr’s paper shop.
I
delivered the papers for Mrs Kerr when I was a boy; but Mr Sutherland
bought that shop and changed it to a fruit and
veg shop.
Mrs Kerr’s daughter, I don’t remember if it
was Betty or Jessie, , married the laddie Bangholm and they built a
newspaper shop next to the entrance to Haugh Park, because Mr Sutherland
never bothered with that kind of business, papers and fags and sweeties
and stuff like that." |
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Opposite the School
"The
chip shop opposite the school used to be Mrs
Finlays grocers shop back when I was a kid at the school.
She had these wee bags of broken biscuits all made up,
that they sold to the school kids." |
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Piggery
"The Kerr’s had a
Guest House beside the school; that’s the house which used to belong to
the Brand family.
The Brand’s piggery was at the back of it next
to the school when I was wee. It was just
beside the janitor’s house.
Jock Dow used to work for Mr Brand, he was a
bit daft, but a good worker." |
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Brickworks
"My dad used to
'chum' Sandy Preston
as he delivered bricks that were made in the
Longstone’s brickworks. The brickworks
aren’t there now of course. The Bus Depot
stands where the brickworks used to be.
Hailes Quarry was right behind the brickworks
back then. The quarry was actually a part
of the brickworks and the quarry managers’ house was just a few yards from
our house in the cottages.
Later,
his house was turned into a sort of midwives'
station where mothers from the village went to see the midwife and get
powdered milk and wee bottles of orange juice for their bairns.
I don’t know what it is now, but it’s the
sandstone house, just beside the roundabout opposite the bus depot."
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Robert Laird, Longstone, Edinburgh:
March/April, 2011 |
