With thanks to Aileen Farrell who shared this photo. It looks like a medal or commemorative badge for Blantyre Highland Games. Commissioned by organisers Blantyre Round Table, I wonder if any of the organisers can tell me more what this was for? Medals for winning races?
During the first week of May 1977, part of the David Livingstone Centre was badly damaged involving a freak accident with a giant tanker. A 32t large tanker used for carrying bitumen for road repairs around the Memorial, smashed into the side of the historic building on the first Monday in May, causing considerable damage. […]
Perhaps inspired by the Royal family’s love of Ice Skating, many towns across the UK in Victorian Times had their own club for the new winter leisure past-time of ‘skating’. Blantyre was no exception, with an Ice Skating club already formed by February 1865. Newspaper reports made announcements when and if the ice was suitable […]
Here’s an interesting little story taken from a small book I’m writing about the Livingstone Memorial Church, Blantyre. During the evening of Thursday 10th January 1895 sometime between 9pm and 10pm, an explosion took place in the Livingstone Memorial Church, Glasgow Road, Blantyre. The minister Rev Mr Hugh and the church officer Mr Walter Ewing, being […]
On Wednesday 6th March 1895, Mr William F Hendrie, an early photographer in Blantyre gave a wonderful limelight lantern view showing for the public. Featuring his own photographs, the event combined not just displaying photos, but a lecture on the Homes, Haunts & Lyrics of poet, Rabbie Burns. The event took place in the Stonefield […]
On Tuesday 9th April 1895, there was a bit of a scene at the former miners’ homes at Dixons Rows, Stonefield, Blantyre. Making the newspapers was a story about a miner residing at those houses who was forcibly evicted. At the insistence of Coalmasters William Dixon Ltd, (who owned the houses), this particular miner had […]
In May 1895, a measles epidemic had broken out in Blantyre and by the end of that month, so many local children were ill, that authorities were forced to take action. Blantyre School Board held an urgent meeting, Mr John Craig of Bellsfield presiding. The prevalence of measles had already meant the earlier closure of […]